


Hale House Is Burning

by write_light



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Humor, M/M, Male Slash, Werewolves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-08
Updated: 2014-01-08
Packaged: 2018-01-08 00:07:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 25,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1125998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/write_light/pseuds/write_light
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's not easy being a kid in love with a werewolf – or vice versa – and it's even harder when you throw in a pack of alphas, a power-mad uncle with a book of blood magic, and a half-dozen very late college applications. But nothing compares to the difficulty of saying goodbye to your past, something both Stiles and Derek have to figure out for themselves.  A simple trip to Disneyland turns into Stiles' (and the sheriff's) longest day ever when Derek shows up, fangs and all.</p><p>Written for <a class="i-ljuser-profile" href="http://sterek-big-bang.livejournal.com/profile"><img class="i-ljuser-userhead"/></a><a class="i-ljuser-username" href="http://sterek-big-bang.livejournal.com/"></a><b>sterek_big_bang</b> 2013.  A Sterek-over-the-years AU - how they got together, how they fell apart, and how it all changed with one drastic decision.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue ~ Fantasyland || Part One ~ The Yearbook

**Author's Note:**

> **Specific Warnings:** Canon-divergent in S2 and especially in and after 3A; pre- and post-series elements; dark magic and light; torture and attempted murder; Insane!Peter, surprisingly large amounts of unexpected fluff amid the copious angst. Pairing(s): Stiles/Derek, unresolved Stiles/Lydia. Rating: Hard R / NC-17 only in parts (Sterek only).  
>  **Spoilers:** Through 3.12  
>  **Beta:** [morena_evensong](), whom I owe as much for her story help as for her beta work; thanks also to my own personal beta, [afg1](), for hand-holding and encouragement and plot-hole-finding.  
>  **Artist:** [thecheekydragon](), who has brought the story to life in her art. I've included her art throughout the story as well as in a separate art chapter at the end.

__

 

 

**_If only._ **   


If only Derek hadn't insisted on shadowing them through the park that day, from Main Street USA all the way to Mr. Toad's Wild Ride.

***

Stiles was a complete wreck by the end of the Matterhorn Bobsleds ride, praying that his dad hadn't noticed there were _two_ Abominable Snowmen roaring at them from the dark - red eyes, claws and all….

"Was that … Derek Hale on the Matterhorn?" his father asked as they exited.  "And in the Haunted Mansion, and-" he shook his head in disbelief, "It's a Small World?"

He paused because Stiles was paler than usual, a sign of guilt.

"Stiles?  Why is Derek in Disneyland?  Why is he following us?"

"What? Dad! That's crazy!" Stiles countered, off balance.  "Derek hates – _would hate_ – Disneyland."

"Every time you say I'm crazy for seeing something impossible, it's always _exactly_ what I thought it was.  Oh hello, Derek."

"Ha ha, very funny, Dad.  Think I'm gonna just turn around and find him-"

"Hello, Sheriff Stilinski."

Stiles froze at the deep voice from behind him.  His mouth moved around explanations, excuses, evasions - his hand went back reflexively to grab Derek's shirt, a life preserver in the sea he'd just been plunged into.

"It's a really, really long story, Dad."

"Well, we're in Fantasyland, so this should be perfect."

 

* * *

 

  
**Part 1: The Yearbook** (pre-series)  
 _In the pages of a book, Stiles discovers something about himself._

 

__

  
_Papa S: Start at the beginning, Stiles._

_Stiles: Well, Dad, um…. I'm a sophomore at USC, and Derek isn't dead after all._

_Papa S: I mean start at the very beginning._

_Stiles: I still want to ride Small World again today._

_Derek: No, you don't._

_Papa S: No one in their right mind would._

_Stiles: Well, uh, okay, let's go with 9 th grade.  _

 

 

 

Stiles loaded the textbooks into his bookbag; English Lit first so it would be far at the bottom, Algebra last because it was busywork and in between two more dead weights that pulled at his arm until he felt afraid to swing it up on his shoulder. Afraid he'd fall over backward in the crowded hallway like a complete freshman idiot.  His locker door slammed shut.

"Stilinski!" Jackson snarled at him, one hand splayed across Stiles' locker door.  "You probably shouldn't bother with tryouts."

He looked right back at Jackson, hiding his anger with humor.

"I thought I might anyway," Stiles said bravely.  "Gotta do something to put muscles on this."  He gestured at his lanky body.  It was humiliating, but it worked. Then an even better distraction came along.

"Babe, he's going to try out," Jackson said, grabbing Lydia to him.

Lydia gave Stiles a quick and disinterested glance as Jackson wrapped his arm around her.

"Hm.  That's nice.  Off you two go then.  I'll be in the library."

"The what?  Why?" Jackson complained, but Lydia was already disentangled and heading around the corner.

Jackson glowered at Stiles, who had made the mistake of following Lydia around the corner with his eyes as far as he could, then with his head and then with most of his upper body.

"I've uh – known her for ages - we go w-way back," Stiles stammered.

"Skip it if you know what's good for you," Jackson hissed.  "And skip practice too."  He shoved Stiles against the lockers and left.

***

Stiles followed Lydia into the school library, but couldn't see where she'd gone.  She was the prettiest girl he'd ever seen. She knew answers to questions even he didn't know – answers he might have known if he'd been paying attention to something other than her.

He crept along the rows of shelves like a spy until he saw her at a table in the back and settled into a chair with a good view of her.  He caught the librarian giving him an odd look, so he reached casually back to grab a book off the shelf behind him.  He opened it and peered over the top at Lydia - just his eyes showing above the oversized numbers on the front cover.  She was beauty itself, he thought: long red hair, full lips, a perfect nose, breasts he wouldn't mind seeing more of.

"Mr. Stilinski was arrested today for being a creepy stalker," he thought, and sat back quickly, attempting his most casual, carefree pose, smacking his head loudly on the shelf just behind him.

Lydia looked over, saw nothing but a grimacing, head-rubbing weirdo, and went back to putting on her lipstick while mentally answering the chapter study questions.

The book Stiles was pretending to read tipped over as he sat forward, slamming loudly onto the table.  The pages ruffled to a stop and Stiles desperately pretended to be fascinated by the page it had fallen open to, quickly realizing that he'd grabbed an old yearbook and was looking at a page of unflattering senior portraits.

"Hadley, Kathrin," he said under his breath.  Well good for you, Kathrin.  Hope you got into a good college."

He stopped at the next picture, or rather the next picture stopped _him_.  Cold.  He was looking into the eyes of a kid who looked like he had barely managed to suppress the terror inside for the one millisecond it took to record his image.  He was a young man with piercing eyes and a face that seemed to radiate pain.

Stiles flipped away from Derek Hale, took a deep breath, and then spent some time in the T's, looking at the display of bad hair, plastic grins and pimples that grandmothers could somehow swear were not there at all.

When he flipped back to the H's, it was because he wanted to.  He felt… excitement.  The dark-haired young man looked both wild and contained - caged in some way.  Stiles' eyes went back and forth from the man's eyes to his mouth, up along his jaw line and then back down, following the trail of his thumb.  "Derek Hale," he said, out loud.  He stopped his thumb, cleared his throat, and looked across the desks at Lydia.

Lydia was reading a book - their biology book, it looked like.  She had the end of a pencil between her teeth, pausing occasionally to take it out of her mouth, make a note, and then put it back.  _He bent over when the pencil was out of her mouth and kissed her, softly.  She tilted her head up and kissed him back, longingly, breaking the kiss to look up at him with adoration.  "You…," she said softly.  A tingle ran across his skin, delicate and arousing._

And then Jackson got in the way and Stiles couldn't see her anymore.  Stiles shook his head and unpuckered his lips as the fantasy vanished. He swept a glance around the room but it looked like no one had seen him.  His hands still gripped the yearbook in front of him and he sank behind it again, hoping Jackson would ignore him.

Derek Hale, however, was staring right at him, he was sure.  The eyebrows were severe, the jaw tight, and the lips a rare chink in his armor.  Derek was the only one on the page who wasn't smiling, not even faking it.  Stiles watched that face with equal intensity, hoping Derek would say something, maybe tell him what was wrong.  Derek's black hair stood up, wilder even than Stiles' before he buzzed it all off. Stiles imagined it wet, flattened by the rain _– a soft rain.  It fell on them both, and ran slowly down Derek's face, both of them breathing heavily.  Drops hung on Derek's ear and chin before falling onto the now-transparent white shirt he was wearing - the same one as in the yearbook photo.  Derek's lips looked soft like Lydia's and his wet shirt clung to his chest._

There's that tingle again, he thought. A sharper tingle than the one with Lydia, but it goes to the same place.  _My hand touched Derek's chest and he pulled away, as if surprised._

Stiles snapped back to the stale dry smell of the library, to the humming fluorescent light of reality without rain or romance.  He was harder than could remember being.  He thought about this, but the thoughts were unsettling.

Jackson had fled the library and the knowledge it threatened to impart.  Lydia was brushing her hair slowly, distractedly, looking as amazing as ever.  Stiles would put his hand on her chest, if he didn't think she'd back away just as fast as Derek - and beat him to death with her brush too.  In the yearbook in front of him, there was a senior from years ago: a tall, dark stranger who raised issues Stiles hadn't needed or wanted to give a lot of thought to.

"Apparently, I like both," he thought, and regretted it immediately because the words summarized the feelings of the past few years into a label he wasn't ready to wear. "Twice the dates for me, right?" he said, impressed at his ability to be so pathetic and so unfunny at the same time.

"Twice the dates? When was your first one?" Scott joked, laughing as he sat down beside Stiles.

Stiles jolted up and slammed the yearbook shut with a _crack_!  Everyone in the library looked up and stared.

"What's up with you?" Scott asked quietly.

"Just studying," Stiles said, wishing his dick would just go away.  For a few minutes, anyway.  Thank god for solid oak tables, he thought, feeling the heat rise in his cheeks.

"A yearbook?  Are you going to date someone who graduated… a college girl?" Scott asked, trying to look inside.

"No, I- this was…" Stiles fumbled.  He snatched the yearbook back and turned to look at the shelf he'd grabbed it from, but it betrayed him by being full of yearbooks and nothing else.  "Huh, thought that was the bisexual section.  The bi _ology_ section," he corrected instantly, but it was too little, too loud.

"The what?" Scott laughed again, and he didn't stop laughing until they were outside, ejected by the librarian with a stern warning and one brief glance right through them from Lydia.

"What is wrong with you?" Scott wondered aloud as they headed down the hall. He put his arm around Stiles' shoulder.  "You know what's wrong?  You need a girlfriend, someone weird but smart like you."

Stiles was silent.  He had friends, and Scott was the best of them, but Derek Hale….

***

The face from the yearbook lingered in his memory as he sat in front of the computer that night trying to study for his test while searching the Internet for stories about Derek Hale.  He found details of the fire that his father had never shared, horrible things.  So many Hales had died, but one survivor, Peter Hale, was in the local hospital's psychiatric ward, described as heavily burned and catatonic.

Late that night, after his father had knocked twice and told him to get to bed, Stiles found a few pictures of Derek from around the time of the fire, looking particularly distraught.  He found a small picture of Derek a couple of years after graduation, looking older and more solid - undeniably better.   And then Derek vanished.  Fire, disaster, death… and he was gone.  Stiles wasn't proud of the thoughts he was having about 19-year-old Derek Hale as he lay there in the dark, and he had to bury his face in the pillow so his father wouldn't overhear his son's sex life, such as it was.   He wiped off with his t-shirt and made a mental note to do the laundry the next day.

That note vanished the minute he lay back and closed his eyes.  A young man with haunted eyes stood there looking at him and that was all that mattered.

***

The hospital at night was never fully quiet.  It beeped and whirred; murmurs of hushed voices carried far, soft-soled shoes whispered down the tile halls, and the occasional moans of the ill went unanswered in their dim rooms.  But the nighttime hospital was lonely too, turned inward – even the nurses kept their voices low and their heads lower.

Peter Hale was a good patient, most of the time, but once a month he escaped.  The moon released him from the prison of his body and allowed the wolf to run free.  He had been home once already, and returned now, seeking the only thing that could restore him.

It felt good to run again, if only for one night, but after failing to find the book in the ruins of Hale House, Peter was afraid that he would never find it again and would have to endure Nurse Jennifer's cheer for the rest of his life. He could be in this state, trapped in his hospital room while Hale House crumbled into ruin and Laura and Derek strutted around unharmed.

Still in wolf form, Peter leaped from the main hall into the yawning blackness of the basement and reached out with his wolf senses.  _Nothing_.  He didn't dare shift back yet- it could kill him.  He shifted back slightly, enough to speak clearly and as his fangs withdrew, he called out to the book.  It was an old spell, one of the first he'd learned, and the answer came instantly, from below the ruined beams and debris.

"That's where I left you!" he said softly in a tone used for a long-lost friend thought dead and found alive again, miraculously.

He tossed burned beams and chunks of cement aside like they were sticks and pebbles until he finally he saw the loose drain cover.

It was there, hidden in a small cavity where he'd slipped it when Kate Argent first attacked.  It was undamaged, untouched by fire, unlike him.  He pulled the small book free, its unassuming cover a dingey gray-green, yet still soft and inviting.  He opened it cautiously and several spells flashed past as he slowly flipped through the book.  He found the page he needed almost immediately.

He memorized the words, sliding his claw along each line, then placed the book back in its hiding place.  Tears rolled down his cheeks, tears of relief that he was no longer abandoned.  He couldn't let his book fall into anyone else's hands now. It would have to remain here in the house for now, well hidden, until he'd recovered fully.  But having the spell would speed that process.

Outside, the sky was still dark, a blessing of late fall, but he had to get back before he was missed.  Too much depended on careful patience and regeneration. Becoming the Alpha was only one of many changes he had planned, and if Talia's children died resisting him, the book would find a way to ease that pain.

***

Peter sat back in his wheelchair in the darkened hospital room, feeling the transformation wear off and the burned flesh shrivel up into the scars he'd carried for years now.  The book was there.  He'd find it again during the next full moon, if Derek would only stay out of his way instead of being the annoyance he'd always been.

"My foolish nephew-" he said softly as catatonia gripped him again.

 


	2. Prologue ~ Fantasyland || Part One ~ The Yearbook

 

  
**Part 2.  It's In His Kiss** (Season 1/2)  
Stiles' phone rings a lot his sophomore year.  It's his dad, or it's Scott, usually.  But more often than not, it's that creepy wolf guy.

 

__

Stiles: Are you sure you want the full story?  Maybe get some dinner first?  I hear Blue Bayou does a mean steak.

Papa S: Just get on with it.  And if it has any NC-17 parts, remember I'm your father and a sheriff.  Use that college education to find some euphemisms.

Stiles gulped.  Derek's hand was a warm spot of comfort in the center of his back, his fingertips occasionally scratching small gentle circles on Stiles' knotted muscles.

Stiles: Could you stop that for this next bit, Derek?

__

 

Stiles' phone rang in chemistry class, just when he had his hands full of test tubes he was supposed to mix together with great care.  He muffled the ring as well as he could once the teacher noticed it, not wanting to lose his phone with Derek Hale's name showing up on the screen.

It rang again in his locker while he and Scott were practicing at lunch and now there were two voicemails waiting.  The first was from Derek.  The second was also from Derek.  It was getting weird.

"He called me twice today, Scott," Stiles said under his breath in History. "What does he want with me?"

"How should I know?" Scott replied, as loud as he dared during the quiz.  "Maybe it's werewolf advice for me."

"And he can give that to you directly."  Stiles paused. "You did give him _your_ number, didn't you?"

"He has both," Scott said tersely and pulled up his hoodie, marking the end of the conversation.

"Duuuude, not cool," Stiles said reproachfully.

***

"Look at this!" Stiles exclaimed, shoving his phone in Scott's face as they left the classroom. "Meet me in front of Hale House at 4:00," he read out loud.

"Do you want me to keep you company?" Scott teased. "Because I can't.  I have to uh,… practice."

"Well yeah, you go practice climbing in Allison's window.  I'll just go meet a werewolf in the dark forest.  I'll be sure to wear my red hoodie and carry a basket of goodies for grandma."

Scott's gave an enormously unhelpful shrug; Stiles was abandoned.  He checked his phone again.  3:45.

_Gonna be a bit late_ he texted.

***

The woods were as well lit as dense woods could be, but silent, as if it were much later.  Stiles tried to convince himself that nothing bad could happen in daylight, in springtime, with a werewolf who disliked him…

"You're late," came Derek's deep, angry-sounding voice from behind him.

"Jeez! Don't _do_ that, Derek!" Stiles said, whirling on him and then leaning back when he realized Derek was a foot away.  "I sent you a text," he offered.

"I didn't check," Derek said, looking momentarily off balance.

"What do you want?  What is so urgent that you need to meet today? And why me?  You need to give Scott the werewolf lessons."

"I have books," Derek said calmly.  It had the effect he thought it might.

"Books?" Stiles asked, confused but intrigued.

"Several."

Stiles wasn't sure how to respond.  'So?' seemed rude.  'Why?' seemed even worse.  Derek was watching him, his face motionless.

"For you," Derek added.

The terse communication was throwing Stiles' brain off its rhythm – he didn't know if he should respond, or wait.  He sensed more words were coming, and he was right.

"In the house."

"In that ruin?"

"I lived here," Derek said quickly.

Stiles raised an eyebrow and then blushed with embarrassment when he saw a flicker of pain crossing Derek's face.

"Sorry, Derek.  You- you have books?  For me?"

Derek turned and headed toward the house, leaving Stiles standing with his mouth open, gesturing 'what the hell?' at his back.  Derek continued on without waiting, and Stiles ran to catch up at the door.  As ominous as the house was, it seemed safer to be in there than out in the open.

Derek had books all right.  A small library of them, in fact.  Most of it was in ashes, or half-burned, covered in soot.   Most of it was of little interest, but Derek pointed him toward some of the Hale family history.

***

"He pointed me, literally.  That's all he did was point.  Not another word," Stiles shared with Scott the next day.   "And he said to come back next week.  I think he wants me to help him tidy up."

Scott gave his friend an odd look.

"Well, sort it out, I mean.  Some of it looks really old.  Might be some stuff on werewolves we can use.  There was a whole book on the Argents."

"What did it say?" Scott demanded, suddenly interested.

"Don't know, man – I didn't look inside it."

"Why not?"

"He was standing right in front of it, Scott."

"Go back then," Scott said.

***

Lydia dreamed again that night. Not of Jackson, but of Hale House in all its ominous, cold glory.

_The same man from her other nightmares - this time looking alive and human – is standing behind her.  He points to a window on the second floor.  As she looks up, he whispers in her ear._

_"That one, last door on the right, is where it is.  Take the book from where I hid it.  Find Derek and leave it with him.  Don't let him know you've been there.  And don’t read it."_

She woke with a start, her feet cold and filthy, as if she'd walked across the city in the night.  She was late for school that day.

***

Derek called twice the next Wednesday, the day Stiles was supposed to return.

_Y-e-s_ Stiles typed behind his book.  Out of necessity he kept his texts brief, but figured Derek might just appreciate short words and phrases.

_Just you.  Not showing books to others._

_O-k-a-y-?_ He pocketed the phone quickly when Scott elbowed him in the side.

"Is the reaction what you expected?" Mr. Harris asked him.

"Yeah, he's pretty quiet, but we get along," Stiles answered.

Scott kicked him under the table and Stiles grimaced at him.  Mr. Harris just narrowed his eyes.

"The precipitation reaction in the flask, Mr. Stilinski."

Stiles looked at his flask for the first time in several minutes.  The clear liquid had turned it into a silvered mirror.

"Oh cool!"

Mr. Harris's disdain swept over them both like an icy draft.

"It's fully precipitated into a silver compound," Stiles said, unable to look up.

"Silver - _what_?"

"Silver nitr---ide?" Stiles ventured.

"Highly explosive," hissed the teacher.

"Silver nitr _ate_!  Silver nitrate, yep," Stiles blurted out, and Mr. Harris narrowed his eyes even further, then moved off.

"I'll take Derek Hale over him any day," Stiles said quietly, ignoring the side-eye he got from Scott.

***

Stiles arrived at Hale House, knocked, and finally pushed on the door when no answer came.  Derek was nowhere to be seen, so Stiles called his name.  Silence.

"Nothing.  Great," he muttered.  "You have a creepy house, dude!" he said, hoping Derek would respond.

He made his way from memory, moving slowly up the dark stairs and toward the library.  He could hear a low, unintelligible muttering, repeated over and over, coming from inside.

"God I hope that's you, Derek."

***

The library wasn't as well lit that day – there was no working light and Derek avoided candles.  The cloudy sky gave the room a cool darkness, and in its darkest corner, an even darker shape was nestled.

"Stiles!" The dark shape stood up quickly and came toward him with obvious delight and uncharacteristic nervousness.  Derek was unshaven, several days of stubble, it looked like.  His voice was higher than his usual growl, and the facial hair was…

"An improvement!  That beard-thing.  Very wolfy," Stiles commented.

Derek stopped abruptly a few feet away and again Stiles felt like a rabbit without a hole to duck into.

"You have more books?" Stiles finally got out.

"Books, yes," Derek said.  He'd been planning to say something else, something he'd rehearsed all day, but it wouldn't come out.

***

Stiles quickly forgot about looking at the Argent book he'd seen the week before, because Derek was handing him volume after volume of things he was pretty sure the local library didn't even know existed and might have taken a torch to if they had known.  Some of the books didn't have titles or authors and some of them might have been written in blood instead of ink, judging by the stories inside.

The book they were paging through when it happened was the worst yet: animal things, half-human creatures, and outright monsters that made Derek seem positively charming.  Derek was standing beside Stiles in front of the reading desk, one arm holding down the left side of the book, while Stiles flipped from horror to horror.

Derek could feel Stiles' heart beating a bit faster but it wasn't fear he sensed.  He asked Stiles a question, not even sure what, just hoping to make Stiles turn and look at him.  He did, wide eyes just inches from Derek's face.  Derek stole a kiss - quick but long enough to be clearly intended.

Stiles saw dark eyes, felt warm lips and the scratch of the beard, and then Derek was looking at him again.  It might not have happened.  Except for that tingle.  His heart was beating faster now, and he knew Derek could hear it.

"Did you just-?"

Derek looked down at the book.

"You did!"  There was surprise, but little else - not fear or anger.  "I'm not…" Stiles protested anyway, then mumbled, "Well, I've never given you any reason to think I wasn't, have I?  You and Lydia both."

Derek looked up at him again with great curiosity, still inches away.

"What _was_ that?" Stiles asked finally.

The room around them was almost dark now.

"What I wanted," Derek said, hoping complete honesty would work.  "I thought-"

"I need to get home.  My Dad's been texting me like—" Stiles flipped open the phone "—zero times.  Way to parent, Dad."

"Come back.  For the books.  I'll show you the Argents' story."

"Yeah, well I'm not coming back for the Beauty and the Beast fantasy, because I really don't think I wanna be Beauty, or Little Red Riding Hood, or any of the three little pigs to be honest, and your house really _really_ needs some lights – not the kind that sing and dance either.  Maybe next week, you know if lacrosse practice and whatever… we have a lot of practices these days… So I guess I'll see you later, Derek."

Derek watched Stiles from the landing, saw him collide with the doorframe as he babbled his way out and heard those last words, the half-promise, from a good ten feet outside the door in the pitch-black night.

Derek's head drooped slowly until he was looking at the railing.  His claws shot out, and he drew them across the railing, leaving four more scars on his home.

***

The next day at school, Stiles nearly lost his life.  He'd woken in a panic, thinking "I'm Derek Hale's booty call," so the day was pretty much a mess anyway.

He  approached Lydia, who stood encircled by friends near her locker; he waited impatiently till they'd all left for class.

"Lydia," he said quietly.

She'd known he was there, but looked at him now for the first time.  She was curious.

"Yes?"

Stiles kissed her quickly, hardly his best work.   She didn't respond, at least not the same way he had under Derek's surprise attack.

"Is that all?" she asked, unimpressed yet thoughtful, as if evaluating him.

Stiles was unable to answer at first.  He squeaked out a "yes" and tried to vanish against the lockers, like a chameleon.

"Well.  You might need more practice.  Or you might have better luck with boys.  I'm getting more of a bisexual vibe from you, but that's how a lot of guys your age kiss."

"Kiss?" Jackson glowered, sliding his arm around Lydia.

"I'd love one!" Lydia replied, giving Stiles his one and only chance to escape.  He took it.

***

Stiles went back to Derek a week later with the most mundane of excuses – to see Derek's new lodgings.  The lair – he could find no better word for it – was in a part of town that had him on edge already.  He assumed Derek would hear him coming, given how hard his heart was pounding.   He pulled over and looked down at the map on his phone.

"Where would a werewolf hang out?" he asked as he got out of the jeep.  "Somewhere dark and empty, like his soul."

He realized he was practically on top of the place, but saw only abandoned warehouses on either side.

"Stiles," Derek said.

The voice came from across the street, where Derek stood as if he'd materialized on the spot.  Although he was still a safe distance, Stiles shivered.  It wasn't fear, exactly.  It was Derek's tone, gentler than Stiles had ever heard, or thought possible, from him.

"Love the neighborhood, love what you've done with it," he said, gesturing to the weeds and the trash that clung to them.

"It's dark and empty, like my soul," Derek replied.

Stiles' eyes widened and his mouth hung open briefly until he realized Derek was smiling, or what passed for a smile on Derek's face.  He wasn't actively _frowning_.  Still, Stiles couldn't apologize enough, until Derek finally got tired of it and told him to shut up.  Twice.

***

Stiles stayed late at Derek's, later than he should have, even after his father called and gave him hell.   He helped Derek unpack the books he'd taken from Hale House, including many he'd never seen before.  His eyes were drawn to one with a soft gray-green cover, then to the cover of the one below it, which said only "Argent" in embossed, heavily tarnished silver letters.  It contained scorched pages just like most of the other books and was coated in the same oily film and heavy smell of smoke.

He read it with Derek kneeling behind him, then sitting with his legs crossed and pressing into Stiles back.  Only a few things from the book stuck, and he would share them with Scott, he told himself, but Derek's breath was warm on his neck, short bursts when he spoke in his terse monosyllables, long rhythmic huffs when he read a passage out loud, trying to get Stiles to pay attention.   As fascinating as the story of the Argents was (told from the Hale perspective, he assumed), and as much as Scott needed to read the book, Stiles' brain was fighting against the desire to lean back into Derek.

"I'm utterly distracted," he said out loud without even realizing it.

"Focus, Stiles."

Stiles' hairs stood up on the back of his neck as he felt Derek's breath on him, so he tried again to concentrate on the book.  His mind instead ran through several different scenarios of how the evening might go, and although they all started with a tender bite, they all ended with him under the jaws of a werewolf, or turning into one himself.

Derek knew how Stiles was responding, because his own body was alive with this moment.  He pushed the need aside and moved away to get some perspective, and to get Stiles' neck out of range.

Stiles read on, apparently able to concentrate a bit better now.  Derek took one last long look at him and shook his head before settling into the couch, where he eventually dozed in the late night warmth and stillness.  Stiles texted his father that he was just going to stay with Scott and keep studying and then texted Scott to cover for him.  He ignored Scott's questions and finally shut the phone off.  Derek hadn't woken up despite the constant buzzing.

With the phone silenced, he stared at Derek, an intense, lingering examination that kept returning to Derek's face.  Stiles didn't dare do what he was vividly picturing, what he'd imagined doing when he first saw Derek's picture.  When he was finally able to get his mind off what his dick wanted, he was surprised by what remained there in his thoughts: curiosity, and above all concern.  He thought about Derek losing everyone in his life and wanted to put his hand on his shoulder and tell him it would all work out.

"And if not, I'm here anyway."

***

 

 

Stiles left a short note and let himself out.  The street didn’t scare him now, and the killing machine asleep in its lair was an ally now at least; or else a friend of a very strange sort.  Stiles drove to Scott's house, buoyed by something he assumed was a crush.  It felt like the crush he had on Lydia, but it struck different tones in him.

And he wasn't about to tell Scott he was falling for Derek.  His feet hit the pavement a bit harder when he got out at Scott's house and the night closed in around him.  Derek, if he could protect Stiles, was far behind him now.

***

Derek saw the note when he woke and he couldn't help but smile. He read it again, just three words:  "I'll come back." He put it back down on the table carefully, and put the plain grayish book back on top where it had been.  The book was warm, as if Stiles had just set it down, but he didn't remember unpacking it.

Derek opened it and was spellbound.  It was magic, old magic and dark, judging by the illustrations and incantations. It didn't take long to realize what he held, or what it meant for his family's past and his own future.

This was the book his grandfather had sworn was lost years ago, the one that took his sanity.  He could still hear the endless raving of a desperate and terrified man. He could see the pain and worry on his mother's face as she pushed past him in the doorway.

Peter was there too, and kept a tight hand on Derek's shoulder so he couldn't run away; he could only stand and watch his grandfather frantically tearing apart the library as his mother tried to calm him down.  Peter denied any knowledge of the book, or of having taken it, as did Derek.  Talia listened to their words and their hearts, and wondered if her brother could still hide his lies from her.

"It can't leave me!  Talia, where did it go?  It wasn't finished – _I_ wasn't finished!"

They were the last words Derek heard his grandfather say that made any sense.

 

Derek snapped out of this reverie and dropped the book, shaking it loose from his hand in disgust, and then shoved it away from the note Stiles had left him, away from the paper and the handwriting that cast their own spell on him.

"Come back, Stiles."

***

Summer was always a weird time – free without truly being free, freedom with an ache under it.   Something was pulling Stiles toward regularity and structure, and tugging Scott toward true freedom and escape.  In a town like Beacon Hills, the weird of summer meant Scott wasn't talking to Stiles much, and Derek was an alpha without a pack.  Gerard had been dealt with, Jackson had disappeared, and Stiles found himself at Derek's more and more often, helping him to learn about the threat that had marked his door.

When Stiles wasn't around, Derek opened the spell book cautiously.  Each time it seemed to have new and different spells in it, and each time he closed it quickly.  Once, he'd seen a spell for returning from the dead – the part about biting into a living alpha was painfully familiar.  Peter's madness made sense now.   He decided to share a bit of lore (and some of his fears) with Stiles.

***

"I told you once that werewolves can't do magic. That wasn't true," Derek said to Stiles one night, and he had Stiles' immediate attention. "We've learned never to do magic - to fear it.  It leads to insanity, in a very short time."

"Peter?" Stiles guessed.

Derek nodded, impressed again with Stiles' quickness.

"So you need emissaries to do magic for you."

"Or regular humans."

"Humans?  We- I can't do magic."

"You can be taught.  Emissaries aren't born with all their skills."

"You don't want to teach _me_ to do magic.  Unless you can show me how to improve my love life."

"Does it need-?"

"It doesn't exist, in case you hadn't noticed."

"I've been busy with Peter and the al-"

"Look, don't worry about me.  I'm sure I can-"

He didn't finish that thought because Derek had moved very close - threateningly, perilously, delightfully close, and he was staring that hard Hale stare.  Stiles didn't dare breathe, or blink.

"You are unique," Derek said finally.

"Thanks?"  Stiles exhaled and stepped back slightly, right into Derek's waiting hand, warm against his back in the summer heat.

***

"Does your neck always bruise like this?  People will think I jump you every chance I get."

"You kind of did jump me the first time you got me alone."

"That was a kiss.  One very brief kiss."

"And how many are we up to today?"

"I'd rather your father not get any ideas into his head," Derek said, returning to the bruises.

"Relax.  We'll keep it quiet.  It'll look like a slow burn, like it was inevitable.  Just be your usual self."

"What does that mean?" Derek asked with his eyebrows, pausing briefly with the kissing.

"Trust me."  Stiles gave Derek a look of 'you know what I mean.'

Derek gave him a look right back.

"As much as Derek Hale can trust, I get it," Stiles said.

Derek gave him a worse look.

"Can we magic these bite marks away?" Stiles asked, running his fingers over a spot Derek had just kissed.

Stiles was mentally listing reasons for wearing scarves in summer, and wondering how much sunscreen would cover up a hickey when Derek kissed him full on the mouth and his thoughts evaporated.

"Should I stop?" Derek said, a minute or so later.

"God no don't stop!" Stiles gasped.

The stone floor felt wonderfully cool, especially with Derek's heat on top of him.

 


	3. Slumber Party at Derek's

 

 

 

  
**Part 3.** **Slumber Party at Derek's** (Season 3A)  
Life and death spin out of control when the Alpha pack hits town, but Jennifer and Deucalion aren't the only ones playing a dangerous game – everyone has a stake.  Or claws, or a bat.  Or worse.

 

__

Papa S: So, you're bisexual?

Stiles: Like I told you a few times already today, Dad.

Papa S: I was talking to Derek.

Stiles had never seen Derek blush.  It was kind of eerie.

Stiles: I'm gonna need a Coke or something.  DRY.  Mouth so dry.

__

 

The door to Derek's loft slid shut behind the group with a heavy industrial clanging that each of them heard differently.  Allison heard a prison door being shut and felt closed in, trapped.  Scott put an arm around her, his smile so open and honest that it almost helped calm her.   Lydia heard a voice in the screech of metal on metal, and tried not to listen to it.  She bit her lip and Stiles moved over to talk to her, placing his hand on her arm.  To Stiles the noise of the door signaled Derek's concern for them, a solid and comforting safety.

Cora busied herself with the lock, trying to ignore what she could sense of her brother's mood.  He was confused, she knew.  He wanted them there to be safe, and yet he wanted them gone.  He was nervous like her, but wouldn't share his reasons.

Derek stood there for a moment, back to the others, watching Cora secure the bolt and stealing glances at Stiles when he could get away with it.

It wasn't easy seeing Stiles with Lydia, especially as she grew closer to him.  It wasn't easy seeing Stiles ever, but at least he was here, Derek thought, not outside.  The alpha pack would be circling soon, coming for Scott.  And now Stiles was looking at him – they all were - seeking direction and leadership.

"There are drinks in the kitchen," Derek said, breaking the tense silence.

Judging by the muted reaction, this was not the best start.  He struggled for words to promise safety, and came up empty.  His eyes fell on Stiles now, unavoidably.

"Slumber Party at Derek's!" Stiles said with calculated exuberance and a wide grin, rousing them from their gloom as he'd hoped.  Allison and Cora laughed, Isaac seemed to unwind just a bit, and Lydia took charge, knowing she had to if it was going to be an actual party.

Derek nodded silently to Stiles as Lydia led the rest off toward the kitchen.  It was the tiniest of nods, a wordless 'thank you', and Stiles returned it, keeping his eyes on Derek.   Whatever jealousy had arisen over Derek's attraction to Jennifer was something Stiles dealt with on his own, mostly by obsessing over the fact that he was still not being entirely clear with Lydia about his own divided attentions.

He tipped his head toward the kitchen and said "C'mon, big guy, break out the beer."

Derek moved under Stiles' direction, much to his own surprise.  It felt good to trust someone, anyone, even a little.

***

"You have no mixers?" Lydia complained.

"He's got nothing to mix them with," Cora pointed out, watching Derek enter the kitchen.

"I didn't get a chance to stock up on booze," Derek said, slightly embarrassed.  "I didn't know I'd be providing alcohol to minors."  He looked at Stiles.

"Can't be helped," Stiles replied, wishing Derek would just take the stick out of his butt.  "As long as we have good locks on the doors…" His cheerleading effort was slipping, he could tell.  "Derek, maybe you got something in the cupboards we could munch on?" he asked, and started open doors.

"No, don't bother-" Derek burst out, but Stiles was already poking his head into the cabinets.

"Pots and pans?  You cook?" Scott asked, watching Stiles root around in cupboard after cupboard.

"I can," Derek replied, nervously watching Stiles. "Stiles, the food's in the one by the fridge."

It was too late.  Stiles had already found something far more interesting behind the spaghetti strainer.  He pulled his head out of the cupboard to smile at Derek.

"Pop-tarts!  _Frosted cherry Pop-tarts_ – dude, I love you!"

Stiles regretted his choice of words immediately.  He turned back to the Pop-tarts quickly, missing Derek's embarrassed expression.

" _Lots_ of Pop-tarts.  10, 20… Holy-"

Derek could see Stiles' right hand counting as he took in the full horror of the stash.  Stiles withdrew his head again slowly and looked at Derek with wide eyes this time, his mouth a small "o" of astonishment and concern.

"Thirty boxes is not healthy, man.  Type II diabetes calling,"

"Wolves don't get that.  Do we?  Tell me we don't," Scott said, looking hopefully at Derek for confirmation - a whole new diet opportunity had opened itself to him.

Allison gave him a disapproving punch on the arm.  Derek was rubbing his temples slowly.  Fortunately, Stiles and Lydia opened the food cupboard simultaneously and found a selection of fairly normal food.

"I went shopping," Cora explained.  "If I didn't, we'd be dead by now, wolf or not."  She glared at Derek.

"You live on those?" Isaac asked Derek softly, pointing at the pop-tart stash, also intrigued at the chance he could eat anything and get away with it.

"I can.  My house, my rules."

Cora rolled her eyes, but all Derek could see was Stiles, doing the exact same thing.

 

***

Derek's wish to be left alone had only grown stronger over the dinner Isaac and Stiles had come up with, and through the constant decorating tips from Lydia, which Cora vigorously agreed with.

"You do need a sofa," Scott said. "And a big screen TV.  It would totally fit on that wall."

"You need more chairs," Lydia added.  "At least six."

"I don't entertain," Derek finally snapped.

"Well you have a bed, right?" Stiles asked and, once again, wished he could reel the words back in.  He put his hands up as if to plead utter and total innocence, but only Derek seemed to notice the question.  The lack of chairs had preoccupied the others.

"I do have a bed," Derek said softly. Only Stiles heard.

"And good for you," Stiles laughed nervously.  "Got to get your sleep."  He stressed sleep a bit too loudly, he thought.

Derek met his eyes this time, but the expression was one Stiles still couldn't read.  It was the same puzzled look Derek had on his face when he'd pinned Stiles against his bedroom door and Stiles had refused to back down.

***

Cora had dragged some pillows and blankets from Derek's bed and was lounging on them with Allison and Lydia.  Scott and Stiles were talking, as they sat on the table in the kitchen.  Isaac hovered, uncertain where to put himself.   Derek was standing at the window, looking out at the city, seemingly the only one who remembered why they were hiding there.

A far-off howl, distant but chilling, broke the light-hearted atmosphere and reminded them all of what they were facing that night.  Derek's claws came out and Stiles watched him carefully, staying closer than anyone else.  Isaac moved closer to Allison and Scott stood with Derek.

Another howl came, then more as the Alpha pack closed in.  The night was dark and moonless, and Derek could see nothing outside, but he recognized Deucalion's howl.   And then the howls came from all sides, and he saw them running toward the building.

"Ready!" Scott called out, and was at the door.

The high, wild wolf calls came again from all around the building, then farther off, then fading away.  The pack had passed them by.

Isaac was in position, Allison with her back to him, arrow aimed at the window.  Derek listened, but they were gone, all of them.

"What did they just-" Stiles asked.  He swallowed nervously.  "- _not_ do to us?"

"They're going east," Derek answered.  "The old part of town."

"That's where the current flows strongest," Allison added.

"I need to go after them," Derek said, and starting to unlock the door.

"We'll all go," said Scott.

"No." Derek was firm.

"You can't fight the Alphas alone!" Cora argued.

"Or Ms. Blake," Lydia pointed out, rubbing the marks on her neck.

"I won't involve any of you – she's my problem.  That didn't work last time and it won't work this time - we need to outthink them.  Stiles?"  He gestured at Stiles who was still looking for a weapon to brandish.

"I- uh…" He had no plan ready.

"What are you doing?" Scott asked, angry at being sidelined.

"I'm going to them.  Stiles is coming with me."

"What?! No, no I'm not.  No fangs here."  Stiles bared his very human teeth.  "No mad weapon skills."

"I have an plan," Derek said calmly.

"Care to share it?" Allison asked pointedly.

"Stay here for now.  We'll be back when it's safe.  Both of us, alive, I promise." Derek looked at each of them, ending with Stiles.  "I promise."

Stiles approached the door, but Cora grabbed his arm to stop him.

"Let him go," Derek said firmly, looming over her. "You must not leave this room – no wolves can leave.  Not until we settle this."

"Derek, he's useless in a fight."

"Thanks, Cora," Stiles snapped.

She whirled on him and he stepped back, apologizing.

"See what I mean?" she argued.

"No wolves leave here tonight.  Promise me."

***

"What is your plan, huh?  Fight them?  Flash the yellow high-beams and hope they run scared?" Stiles asked with increasing sarcasm.

Derek shoved him against the side of his car and leaned in.

"Don't make fun of the eyes or I'll bite you myself."

Stiles stood his ground, as always.

"Don't even think about turning me.  It… wouldn't be pretty."

Derek stared at him, their faces inches apart.

"No, no it wouldn't.  You look better as a human."

"So do you," Stiles said, caught between the car and this man, between the eternal dream of losing his virginity, which had nearly gotten him killed twice, and the desire he saw building in Derek's eyes. The tension was about to push him over the edge and for a second he didn't care about Alpha packs or English teaching darachs.

Derek hadn't moved a bit; not closer, not farther away. He just stood there in the cool night air, mouth half open, eyes skittering around Stiles' face.  He wanted it just as much.

He slid his left hand very slowly behind Stiles neck, watching the minute reactions in Stiles' face as skin grazed skin. Stiles tilted his head slightly.  Derek kissed him hard the first time, so unlike the kiss in the library.  Then Stiles' hands were on his sides, on his back, pulling him in for a second and third kiss, each punctuated by gasps when they pulled apart.

Stiles felt only the car, cold and solid at his back and Derek - warm and solid in his arms.  It worked.  It was good.  He let out a whimper, and Derek's hand gripped his neck tighter, his claws out now.  The next kiss was rougher, and Stiles pushed off the car to get closer to Derek.

Then his phone rang.

He almost didn't answer, but it was his dad's ringtone.   He held up a finger and dug his phone out of his pocket.

"Yeah, Dad?" he said, his voice raspy and uneven.

"Stiles, are you all right?  Where are you?"

"With, um, with Scott and some friends at Lydia's."

"It's 10:30. Why aren't you home?"

"Um, because my curfew is 11:00?"

Derek was frozen, unsure what to do.  He was in very dangerous territory with Stiles, and didn't want it to go wrong.

Stiles was watching Derek's lips the entire time he talked to his father.  He was still hungry for them, but in Stiles' ear there was suddenly the sound of screams from wherever his father was.

"Dad?  What was that?!"

"Stay where you are, Stiles.  Inside, doors locked, windows covered.  This alpha wolf pack you told me about is in town and so is that teacher of yours.  It looks like some sort of standoff."

"Dad, get away from them - you can't stop them!"

"Just stay away from the east side.  Stay away from werewolves, Derek included."

"Derek's on our side," Stiles protested, watching Derek's reaction – lowered eyes, his head drooping.

"For fuck's sake, Derek, get angry!" Stiles whispered, his hand covering the phone.

"Son, I'm very glad you told me everything, but I know - knowing you - that it wasn't everything, and there is a whole other chapter you're not telling me, so _stay out of the east side_."

"Dad, listen, you can't beat them."

"We can try.  Gotta go!"

The connection went dead, but Stiles couldn't be sure if his father had hung up or something worse had ended it.

***

"Faster, Derek!" Stiles urged as Derek raced along the hill road toward the sheriff and whatever confrontation the darach had prepared for the pack.  Stiles was afraid it might involve his father.

"Deucalion won't hurt your father," Derek said.

"Ms. Blake will!  Ever since I told dad about you and her-"

"You what?!"

"He had to know, Derek.  I can't leave him in the dark."

"He knows about me?"

"Yeah, he's okay with the wolf thing.  Mostly okay."

"Your father, the sheriff, is okay with werewolves in his town?"

"I explained about good and bad," Stiles said, sensing Derek was worried about something else.  "I didn't tell him about this," Stiles said, gesturing between them.

Derek glanced at him as they sped along the road.  "This?" he asked.

"No going back on this.  But my Dad's in danger.  Nothing else matters."

"You're not going to like what I have in mind."

"This is my Dad, Derek.  If it saves him-"

"It involves magic," Derek said, his voice quiet and serious as he sped down the winding road.

"Yeah, and?"

"And blood."

"Blood?" Stiles grimaced.  "Why does there have to be blood? Whose blood?"

"Mine.  Werewolf blood."

"And this'll work?"

The car skidded around a tight curve and Stiles braced himself on Derek's shoulder.   He pulled his hand back as if it burned him, but Derek was focused on driving as fast as possible.

"It'll work if you do the spell right.  And if we can find the ingredients," he said when the car was back under control.  "There's a place to get what we need, near where the wolves and Jennifer are, then we lure them to us and-"

"If I do the magic?  Are you – no, _I'm_ the insane one, for now."

Derek pulled the small book from the glove box and pushed it into Stiles' hands.

"Why can't you do this?"

"You'll see why," Derek said, screeching to a stop on a dark street.  "If it works."

The east side was a good twenty minutes from Derek's loft, by any sane measure, but Derek could drive it in about ten.  He talked fast, telling Stiles about the book, and about Peter and his grandfather.

"Mental illness in the Hale family?  What a surprise."

"Peter is… unreliable.  He lies.  With me, you take your chances.  He kills people, I get people killed.  You have to decide which is worse."

"And you want me to use a magic book that makes werewolves insane, Derek?  Are you insane? No, don't answer that."

"It has to be this spell.  Deucalion will be expecting everything else we've thought of, and Jennifer can fight us both off is her power is at its peak.  This spell will scatter the pack to wherever they came from."

Stiles read from the page – it seemed too short, too simple, but then there was the blood.

"This is _dangerous blood magic_ – not something to mess with, Derek.  You saw what Peter did to Lydia with it. And he came back from the _dead_ , not exactly sane.  Although I'm not sure Peter was ever-"

"I trust you," Derek said calmly.  "You're good.  The spell won't go dark if you're not dark inside."

"You trust me?  To be the good guy?"

"You are the only one who has ever helped me without trying to use me for something."

"Oh, come on, Scott's not-"

"Scott wants advice that I can't give him anymore.  Allison's family still wants to kill me, Jennifer almost did, and Lydia cares about…well, Lydia.  Cora and Peter expect me to be a Hale.  Isaac, and…" he stopped there, unable to say Boyd's name, or Erica's.  "Your hand, Stiles - _that_ steadies me."

The car skidded to a stop, and Derek flung out his arm to keep Stiles from hitting the dashboard.

"My dad's gonna kill me if the alphas don't, and if they don't, this spell will," Stiles complained, looking out at the dark street.

"Do you remember the words?" Derek said, keeping them on the task at hand.

"Again, no magical powers here."

"Do. You. Remember?"

"Yeah, the spell needs blood.  And … herbs and … now I know where we are!"  Stiles exclaimed.

"Get wolfsbane and rue. We're saving your dad, and Scott, and the rest of this town," Derek said.

***

Stiles hopped the fence of the nursery and headed toward the large "Herbs" sign.  He held his phone screen up to the tags until he found the ones he needed, a small plant with pale yellow flowers and another tagged 'wolfsbane'.  Its flowers were long gone, but the crown of leaves looked strong.   He returned with the pots but Derek wasn't there.

"Derek?  Derek!" Stiles whispered loudly, looking around at the very dark street.  The power had to be out, it was that dark.  Not far off, he could see lights flashing red and blue against the low clouds.  "Derek, how can you be gone, I didn't even do the spell yet?"

Derek emerged from a small building across the street, carrying what looked like road flares in his hands.

Stiles cringed and whispered loudly, "Flares? Those are going to keep my Dad safe?"

Derek shrugged.  "I trust distractions.  The magic – needs a second to work."

Derek transformed, right there by the car. All Stiles could do was watch the fangs and claws emerge, the way Derek's face shifted into something remarkable and inhuman.

"I'll trust you before I trust Peter.  But this spell… every story, like, _ever_ says there's a cost.  That cost can't be you."

Derek stared at him with wolf eyes until Stiles blinked.

"I'll be okay.  Scott, Isaac and Cora are far enough away that it won't affect them."

With that, Derek put his arm to his mouth and bit in deep at the wrist.

"WHOA Derek not now!!  Not all over me," Stiles pleaded but it was too late.

"No time," Derek said, blood running down his chin.  "Look!"

Barely a thousand feet ahead in the road were two large werewolves, likely the twins.  One turned toward them and began to lope forward.

"Do you remember the spell?" Derek asked, shaking more blood on the plants between Stiles' feet.

"I- ohmygod, I so did not need this," Stiles paled and looked away, trying to think of something besides Derek's wrist pulsing blood all over him, or Derek's other hand warm on his shoulder.  He wished with all his heart that the killer werewolf approaching them was not the only thing left to focus on.

"Stiles, concentrate."

"Are you one hundred percent sure it won't just wipe you all out of existence?"

"No," Derek admitted, "but that would solve the problem too.  I can buy you some time – a minute at most."

Derek leaped forward and ran toward the twins.

"Okay. Creepy druid blood spell coming right up."

Another wolf entered the road, and Derek roared at them.  He could see Deucalion in the distance,  still human, but beginning to change.  He was walking implacably forward.

Stiles knelt on the ground behind the car, scraping a torn wolfsbane root across the pavement, forming the circle he saw in the book.  He was gagging at the blood that covered his hands, but he still managed to form the words of the spell.  The thick, pungent sap from the root seemed to glow where it met Derek's blood, brighter with each word Stiles spoke.

The wolf closest to Derek crouched and then leaped at him. Derek hurled the flare at it, and it crushed it in its mouth.  Stiles spoke the last word of the spell and felt only coldness around his heart.  A blinding flash filled the street, and Deucalion recoiled from the fierce light, then vanished, as did the leaping wolf.

Stiles looked at where Derek had been standing, on a street now free of werewolves.

"Derek?  Derek?!  Shit!" He was panicking again.  He looked at the spell, the circle of blood and wolfsbane fading slowly.   He grabbed for his phone, getting Derek's blood all over it, and called his father.

"Dad?" he said when his father finally answered.

"Stiles?!"

"Dad, you okay?!"

"I'm not sure.  That teacher of yours was fighting the wolves, but she … I think one of them killed her.  Then they ran past us down a side street, there was a flash of light and… They're all gone."

"All of them?"  Stiles' voice was honest in his disbelief, but then he had to lie again.  "Great, Dad.  Well, I'm gonna go home now, just wondered when you'd be getting back.  Thought I might go to bed, sleep in tomorrow."

"What? Yes, okay, yes Stiles," the sheriff said, confused.

"Don't wake me when you get back, okay?"

"Okay… you… sleep well, son."

Stiles hung up and checked the dark street again.  No wolves.  He went carefully around the car, avoiding the marks he'd made in blood.  The symbols still glowed faintly.  He sat in the driver's seat of Derek's car and flicked on the high beams.  No Derek.  Nothing but a faint smell of blood and toxic plants and fear-sweat.

"Don't ask me to do that again, Derek.  Not going to be your druid-on-call."

***

"You'd better be there.  You'd better be there," Stiles repeated over and over as he drove to Hale House, arms and legs soaked in crusting blood and covered with sharp-smelling sap.  When he arrived, everything was dark.  The door was locked.

"No, no no no…."

After several useless attempts at hurling his body against the door, he grabbed a large rock and smashed his way in through the front window.  He made his way through the darkness and eventually found Derek motionless on the floor of an upstairs room, still in werewolf form. The same odd smell from the street filled the room – ozone and the heavy stench of the herbs and blood.

"Derek!"  Stiles yelled, rolling Derek over and lifting the werewolf's head and shoulders onto his bloody thigh.  He kept one hand under Derek's head and felt for a pulse with the other, but nothing moved. "Derek, wake up. _Derek?_ "

He pounded his fist on Derek's chest, certain that he'd cast the magic wrong.  No response, no breath he could feel, and still no pulse.  Seconds passed as he laid Derek flat again and pressed down with all his weight, using what CPR he could remember.

"Come on, big guy – full moon's in three days –you know how you love a full moon," he said, his voice slipping into panic.  "I told you I was no good at magic."  Then he felt a beat kick in under his fingers, and Derek warmed noticeably.

Stiles rested his head against Derek's now-breathing body for a minute, then hugged him there on the floor, as best he could.  He gently laid Derek back across his legs, the wolf-browed, sharp-fanged monster that he would not let die.

"Stay with me Derek," he pleaded as he caressed Derek's face. "Why did we use dark magic?  When is that ever a good idea?  Why am I cradling a werewolf on my lap in a burnt-out house when I have a poetry assignment due?"

He felt the pulse in Derek's neck grow stronger.  Slowly, he slid his hand up across Derek's jaw and reached out one finger to touch the tip of one fang out of sheer curiosity.  It was sharp and white and dangerous. Derek inhaled at the touch.  Stiles felt the bones melt away under his fingertips, saw the face he preferred re-emerge.  It was an odd sensation, feeling Derek transform – intimate, not lustful like their other encounters.

"Stiles," Derek said weakly, eyes still closed.

"Here, I'm here.  I got ya."

"Will you stay?  I need you here.   I need time-"

"To recover, I know.  I won't leave.  I can do my project this weekend-"

"Time to talk to you. And I want to turn-"

"Oh no you don't.  I'm staying human, Derek," Stiles babbled in his excited state.  "You take your chances with that, just like I do with you."

"I want to turn _over_ , Stiles.  I'm lying on a nail."

When he'd moved off the nail, he settled his head again slowly against Stiles' stomach, eyes still closed.

"Where are the alphas?" Stiles asked finally.

"Far away from here.  Scattered."

"But not dead?"

"Possibly very alive.  Definitely scared of returning to threaten us again," Derek said, so weakly that Stiles feared he was slipping away again.

"Look, you wanna talk, you should probably keep talking.  Or I can keep talking," Stiles said, but still their words slowed.  Fatigue and the early hour and the effects of the magic caught up with them. As Derek's warmth spread into Stiles' hands and legs, the dark room seemed to fade to a warm gray around them.

Stiles had been sliding his thumb very slowly up and down Derek's jaw, enjoying the dark stubble, and he realized now just how _much_ he enjoyed it.  He stopped rubbing Derek's face abruptly, wondering if he was ready for this to be real.  Derek opened his eyes for the first time, dark in the abandoned shell of Hale House where the moonlight barely entered.

"Please keep doing that," Derek said softly.

Stiles ran his fingertips slowly down to Derek's chin, then back up even slower, stumbling over the skin nearer his ear, now aware of how his body approved of this and sure it was having the same effect on Derek.

"I don't have a bed here," Derek mumbled.

"Not a problem," Stiles said, surprising himself with this newfound clarity and boldness.

"I don't have much here at all," Derek whispered, and raised his hand to Stiles' face, sliding the tips of his fingers along Stiles' cheek with a gentleness that made Stiles shake with the need he could feel under that affectionate touch.

What happened next might have been a hallucination brought on by the wolfsbane toxins, or the magic they had invoked.   Derek lifted himself slowly with one arm, his face never more than a few inches from Stiles as he drew up even, eye to eye.  Derek was looking at him in the dim predawn light - the room had vanished for both of them.  Derek sank his face into Stiles' neck and pressed his warm lips against it over and over again, kissing his way slowly up to Stiles jaw until Stiles found himself gripping Derek by the back of the neck as Derek had held him before.  He pulled Derek in to kiss him over and over.

It _might_ have been a hallucination, except for what happened the next morning at Derek's loft.

***

Derek parked the car and looked over at Stiles in the passenger's seat; he was rubbing his face vigorously on the inside of his hoodie.  Derek stared at him, not sure what it meant.

"We can do this however you want," he said finally, hearing Stiles' heart racing.

"Do what?  Nothing to tell, nothing to share.  Just _our_ thing, okay?"

"Okay," Derek said softly.  He gave it ten minutes until everyone knew about their night.

Scott was already coming out the front door, Allison and Isaac behind him.  They looked as disheveled as Stiles from their night awake.  Derek, somehow, looked composed and perfect, and it annoyed Stiles no end.

" Where were you? What happened?!" Scott demanded angrily.

"Whose blood is that?" Allison asked, looking more worried than angry as she stared at the bloodstains all over Stiles' jeans.

"It's Derek's," Stiles said as casually as he could. "We did a thing, got rid of the alphas."

"What did you do?"  Scott asked.  "How?"

"Dad's okay, town's okay for now, Scott."

"Let's go inside," Derek replied.

Lydia was watching from the staircase when they entered, and she looked distinctly unhappy.  Stiles looked up at her, guiltily.

***

They wanted to avoid discussing the magic, but they had something else they wanted to avoid mentioning at all, so they decided to get the magic out there as a distraction.   By the time they finished, Lydia was sitting with her arms wrapped around herself and her face frozen, unreadable.

"Lydia?" Stiles asked, "what's going on?"

"What you did!" she snapped, raising her head to glare at him.  "It isn’t right."

Stiles flushed a bright pink.

"Where did you learn druid magic anyway?" Scott asked.

"From me," Derek interjected before Stiles could get any more flustered.  "Deucalion knows we're serious now.  He won't be back."

"No, it's not right," Lydia whispered angrily, and Stiles moved away, feeling hurt.  Settling near Scott, he was so focused on Lydia's outburst that he didn't notice Scott's shock, the small sniff he took, and the way his head pivoted to Derek instantly.

"What is it, Lyd?" Allison asked her gently, trying to comfort her.

"It's Grandpa's magic," Cora said, an undercurrent of anger in her voice.  "You're _using_ Stiles. In so many ways," she hissed into Derek's ear.

Scott was looking at Derek with dismay, and then back at Stiles, trying to make sense of what his nose was telling him.

"Come on we'll get you washed up," Scott said, grabbing Stiles by the shoulder and yanking him awkwardly up and out of the room.

***

"How long?" Scott demanded.

"What? I –" Stiles stopped under Scott's furious gaze.

"You said we were brothers, and we're at least best friends.  HOW LONG?"

"Not that long."

"Why not Danny?"

"Dude, what?  You match me up with the first gay guy you can think of?"

"Well," and he thought carefully, "Oscar - he's cute enough."

"Yeah, well Derek's cuter.  I guess I just have a thing for-"

"Do not _even_ get close to finishing that sentence."  Scott put his hands over his ears and paced his confusion out.

"I thought you and Lydia-" he said finally.

"I think we still are…" Stiles mumbled.

"Is that what she's upset about?"

"No, I ... it could be.  But I think it's the magic.  It was powerful.  And dark."

"So what are you, Stiles?"

There was a long silence.

"I'm happy."

Scott had no reply but to stare at his friend.

"Way to be supportive," Stiles muttered.

"Were you at least safe?  And why is the smell so strong?  Did he lick you head to toe?

"We didn't – stop trying to picture Derek and me together!" Stiles yelled as the kitchen door swung open.

Allison and Isaac said only one word, in unison: "What?!" Their eyes said the rest.

***  
Cora had left in anger, Lydia with her.  Stiles' protests that he was done with magic seemed to calm her only a little.  Scott and Allison left in confusion but wanting very much to check on their families, while Isaac went out "for fresh air," as he put it tactfully.

"Well, that took all of five minutes," Stiles complained, now left alone in the loft with Derek.

"I gave it ten.  I underestimated your friends."

"They're your friends too."

Derek didn't respond.  He'd ripped into a box of Pop-tarts and was stuffing one into his mouth.

"Enough with the emotional eating, Wolfman Snack," Stiles said, grabbing the rest from Derek and devouring two pastries in one terrifying mouthful.

Derek gave him a fiercely possessive look that would have sent Stiles running a year earlier.  Stiles smiled back instead, a big toothy cherry-and-frosting-filled grin.  For once, Derek was truly at a loss for words.

After a moment of watching Stiles, he rested his hand protectively on Stiles' shoulder and said "We need to put the book away where it won't be found."

"Leave it with me.  There's a place at the station no one will ever find it."

"Leaving it anywhere near you is the last thing I want to do."

"Hey, I saved _your_ ass," Stiles said boldly.  "And I'm not insane."

"All magic leaves some darkness behind."

"Uhh….What?!  You tell me that now?  I should cast a spell to—to—"

"I'm not sure I like what that magic's doing to you."

Stiles took that as Derek being as funny as Derek could, and laughed, then realized the time.

"Shit, I have to get home! My dad will figure out I'm not there eventually."

He was gone in a minute.  Derek settled where Cora and Lydia had created a makeshift couch, pulling his hands up to his face so he could smell Stiles on them.

***

That evening, Derek had a visitor.

"Peter," he said coldly, not opening the door more than a foot.

"Dearest nephew-" Peter said, then stopped, puzzled, and inhaled.  "-you smell like- " He leaned in suddenly to sniff and Derek dodged back too late. "Is that Stiles?  What are you thinking, going to bed with that stench all over you?  Too worn out by your little magic trick?"

Peter was eager to talk about what Derek and Stiles had done to remove the Alpha threat, but Derek's confused expression was all the invitation he needed to pursue this new, more entertaining topic.

"I'm not discussing it with you," Derek said, not moving aside or inviting Peter in.

"It? There's an _it_?  You two are an 'it'?  You won't tell me about him when you're already rubbing his scent all over you?"  The words were slow and calculated, as always, the voice of family and wisdom and all the lies Derek had never been able to detect soon enough.  "I should have spoken up sooner, but I pretended not to see what I didn't want to see.  Your mother would have snapped his little neck for – can I just come in, please?" Peter asked finally, irritated at being kept in the hall.

Derek let him in without a word. Peter's words had put him off balance.

"Now, please don't think I would ever do anything to you.  But his father might.  Sleeping with the son of the sheriff isn't exactly keeping a low profile.  And one who's barely seventeen-"

"Shut. Up!"  It was no longer shy and deferent, but backed by the eyes of an alpha.

"I'm surprised you can still do that, since you have no real pack to speak of.  You weren't planning on turning _him_ , were you?  Oh, no Derek, not that one," he sighed, shaking his head with melodramatic disappointment.  "Now tell me what you did last night.  Besides Stiles."

Derek took a swing at Peter, but Peter was fast enough to dodge the first blow and grab Derek's arm.

"Truce!" he said quickly.  "Just tell me about your spell.  And offer me a drink."

***

With Derek off in the kitchen, Peter closed his eyes and mouthed a few words.  The spell book did not reveal itself; it was already resting in a box in the evidence locker at the sheriff's station.

"Never mind the drink, Derek." Peter called out.  "Just remember, you're a terrible judge of character.  After all you've gone through, why trust anyone, especially a human?"

He let himself out.

Derek returned to an empty room, confused and worried.  He needed help – someone who would know how to stop Peter.

***

Stiles woke that same night, certain there was someone in his room.

"Dad?" he ventured.  Nothing.

He could see the outline of someone near the door.

"Derek?"

"Derek?" came the mocking reply, amused and a little too pleased.

"Peter," Stiles frowned.  "Get out of my house.  And get out of my bedroom at midnight you gigantic creep."

"I'm not a vampire, Stiles.  You can't uninvite me."

"DAD!"

"Oh hush."

"What do you want?  You have about 30 seconds."

"I want to know how you managed that little trick.  That was quite a lot of power you wielded, real power."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Do you know what you turned down, when I offered you the bite?  Well among other far more incredible things, you turned down the opportunity to sit in the stench of a horny teenager's bedroom and have your stomach want to empty itself.  So many… _delightful_ smells – sweaty socks, filthy t-shirts, my brother's blood, and hell, even my brother's saliva all over your neck.  And where's Daddy?  What would he say if he knew?"

Peter tilted his head and Stiles could see the cocky grin.  Stiles closed his mouth, his response choked off by the knot in his stomach.

"What I really want to know, Stiles, is how you got Derek to believe in something again.  Because that's power."

"I thought you wanted to know about–"

"The magic?  Please.  Derek's been using that book for years.  I told him all about how it drove our grandfather insane, but he doesn't care.  But last night, that was an interesting spell, well cast, didn't know humans could make it work.    Didn't even know that one was in the book – Father always said the book didn't show all its pages to him."

"Derek and I.... We-"

"We?  So there's a 'we', too?  Do _we_ know where Derek is keeping the book?"

"Really?" Stiles was getting pissed again. "That's what you came here to-"

"Stiles?"  His father's voice was just outside the door when he knocked.

Peter stepped deeper into shadow as the handle turned and held up one razor claw to his lips.

"Stiles, did you call me?" the sheriff whispered as he stepped into the room.

Stiles lay back quickly, twitching as if in a dream.  He mumbled until his father woke him.

"Are you okay?  You were talking in your sleep."

"Was I?  Hope I didn't say anything incriminating," he joked, trying to look sleepy and yet violently aware of Peter slipping out the door.

"Sounded like a conversation, like two people."

"No one here, Dad, just me.  Just like always," he added, the regret slipping in on its own.

"Hey, don't you worry about that.  You've got good friends and life is crazy enough, especially in this town.  You'll find the right woman eventually.  Focus on school, finish college, get a job, move up in your field.  Sex can wait."

"Until I'm 25?"

"Well," his dad stammered "No, of course not, but… not here and now."

"No worries, Dad."

***

Stiles lay awake for nearly an hour, at first just listening, then looking out his window to see if Peter was lurking. He felt bad for lying to his father.  Just before sleep came, he remembered Derek's expression when they said goodbye that morning.  It was the yearbook photo face, again.  Stiles didn't sleep well that night.

***

The next day, Scott told him Derek and Cora were gone.  Where, or for how long, no one knew.

 


	4. I Can Take a Road That'll See Me Through

 

 

 

 

  
**Part 4.  I Can Take a Road That'll See Me Through** (Season 3B)  
Life comes at you with both fists.  Never ask if the love of a good man is something you deserve.  What you think you deserve leads you only to cold places with sharp edges.

 

 

 

  
Stiles: You remember the time I was in the hospital?  With the blood and the magic and all that?

Papa: Yeah, I-

His eyes reddened as he wiped tears from them.

Stiles: Dad, don't. I'm right here.  I'm okay!  But there was a little more to that than I told you.

Papa: It's- it's this smog. Makes my eyes water.  Why did you have to move to LA of all places?

Derek: I asked him the same thing.

Stiles: Getting away from Peter wasn't reason enough?

 

 

 

"Why did I take AP Chemistry?" Allison moaned, resting her head on her hands as the full extent of the fifteen-page syllabus sank in.

"So you could be my lab partner," Lydia said as though it were a well-established fact.

"Yeah," Allison said slowly, wondering what had brought on that suggestion.  Then her common sense got the upper hand.  "Yes! YES! Lab partners!"

"And shopping partners!" Lydia replied.

Allison stopped celebrating her salvation from AP Hell and looked herself up and down.

"What's wrong with this?  I like leather."

"Shopping for _me_ , primarily," Lydia said.  "You've got your look together already.  But we can always find more ways for me to be pretty."

Allison was briefly surprised by what she chose to take as a Lydia compliment, but recovered enough to invite her new lab partner over for some much-needed help that weekend.

"Lydia, could you- "

"Tomorrow's good," Lydia replied.

"How-"

"You need my help."  She eyed Allison carefully. "You looked kind of spaced out during that redox lecture, kind of like you do now.  Redox is reduction oxidation, and it's mainly an industrial process, but it also allows for electroplating reactions.  I hate electroplating.  It makes such ugly jewelry."

"I'll… remember that.  So tomorrow?"

"When Scott and Isaac are away?  Perfect."

Allison watched Lydia leave, glad to have a guaranteed "A" in Chemistry.  Scott and Isaac left town that evening for a camping trip, Scott called it.

Stiles had disappeared too, but no one noticed until it was almost too late.

***

"Derek isn’t a liar, Stiles.  That's _my_ specialty," Peter said, his voice velvet smooth and rich with pride.  "But he _is_ pathologically unable to love…  probably some childhood trauma with a sad little dead girl."

" _YOU did that!_ " Stiles screamed in his head.  The news of the break-in at the station made sense to him now.

"Or maybe that Argent bitch, maybe that's what pushed him over the edge?" he chuckled, miming shoving someone off a cliff.

Stiles struggled against the magic that held him to the ground but Peter wasn't even looking.

"Who _cares_ , is my point. This is hard evidence over mere words.  He'll believe this, and he'll save you.  And we both want that."  He smiled to himself.

He turned back to Stiles and knelt over the circle of symbols, careful not to damage it.  Stiles' thoughts were increasingly disjointed, the blood pounding in his head and fear, real fear, finally, for his own life.  Peter came closer, his face just inches away.  He shifted, his face distorting, his fangs growing longer.

"All the spells Derek's used over the past few years… it hasn't been good for him – in the head, I mean.  We just need to be sure he listens, and he'll hear you now, no matter where he is."

Peter drew one claw slowly across Stiles' neck and blood welled up.  Stiles felt a burning pain, and under it, he could hear a soft splattering as blood dripped onto the floor.

"I'll make it look good, though, like you were trying for something really serious.  The worst one in the book, maybe?  Should we try de-wolfing him?"  He hesitated.  "No, I think that might be going too far, don't you?  I need Derek Hale, Alpha Wolf.  How about Stiles is trying to make everyone happy, make his wolf stay with him.  How about a love spell?"

Peter flipped through the book as more of Stiles' blood dropped onto the symbols on the floor.

"Oh, yes, this one.  Definitely.  Easy to draw too."  He held the book up for Stiles, who was unable to focus well.  "You like this one?  Just what you two need after he leaves you behind to set out for who knows where."

Stiles screamed for Derek, behind the gag.

"Derek seems to think people will die if they love him.  I think they'll just die anyway."

Stiles could see Peter walking away, closing the door behind him, and then it all faded out.

***

"Where are Scott and Isaac, exactly?"  Lydia asked, as she settled into a chair in Allison's room that night.

"Some werewolf pack thing," Allison said, avoiding what she thought their "camping trip" was really about.

"Men are always trying so hard to bond.  Women just do.  It's like Chapter Two."

"Wow, I totally get Chapter Two now," Allison said, grinning.  "Except… what about bi-valent bonds?"

"They're… bi-valent.  Sort of like Stiles," Lydia said casually, making a note in the margin of her book.  She eventually looked up at Allison's open mouth and wide eyes.  "I probably shouldn't have used that example."

"No, you _needed_ to use that example.  Is he bi?  I thought he was with Derek.  Scott sure did."

"Stiles doesn’t really talk about it.   He's sort of going on the idea that if he keeps kissing me once a month, it'll make more sense."

"Did he tell you he was bi?" Allison asked, sliding the books aside and resting her chin on her hands.

"I knew before he did, way back in freshman year," Lydia said.

"But you're not psychic."

"No, it was the way he kissed," Lydia explained.

"Oh, like all soft and girly?"

"No…" Lydia thought about it briefly.  "More like he was waiting for me to kiss him back more.  I could just tell.  But no labels.  Just wait and see.  He'll tell us all, someday."

"So what's Derek then?" Allison wondered.

"The same.  Well, _obviously_ ," Lydia added, when Allison seemed surprised.

"Right, of course.  So he's hot for guys too, human guys - _Homo sapiens._ He's _homo_ -bisexual!"  She buried her face in the bedspread in shame while Lydia appeared to be close to laughing herself.

"Stiles-sexual, more like.  Given the lack of other evidence.  I'm worried about Stiles.  If Derek and Stiles used magic - they could do it again.  And it was really dark magic if it used blood.  I could feel it on him when he came back.  And he's had nightmares since Derek left."

"They wouldn't be that stupid, Lydia.  I wouldn't put it past Scott to be that impulsive, though.  Sometimes, honestly.  Hunters are matriarchal."

Lydia looked up from the equations, intrigued by this.

"Women lead, men fight. That's how it's always been in our family.  For a long time."

"So… are you in charge now that your mom is gone?" Lydia asked.

"I'm not old enough."

"We should be in charge.  We could get the boys to stop fighting."

Allison nodded her agreement.

"Well, fight _less_ ," Lydia added.  "If I'd been in charge of Beacon Hills, none of this would have happened – not the kanima, the Alpha pack, and not Peter controlling me from the grave, telling me to poison people, to move that book to Derek's-" Lydia froze.  "Oh god, I did that."

"What are you talking about?" Allison was concerned at how pale Lydia had turned.

"Peter got me to put the book in Derek's house before we even knew what it was.  That's how Derek and Stiles knew that spell to use against the alphas."

"Peter did that?  Why?  He couldn't have known Deucalion was coming."

"Peter wants… he wants to be in control.  That book was so dark… it scared me just touching it."

Lydia was shaking now with the memories.  Allison put her arm around her to comfort her but Lydia soon stood up.

"We need to get it!" she said to Allison.  "Can you break into Derek's loft?"

"We can't do that!"

"That book is a trap.  It's going to close on someone sooner or later and it's probably going to be Stiles or Derek or both.

***  
In the mountains of the northern Sierra, Isaac and Scott ran through the moonlight.  It helped to clarify their pack relationship, if not their Allison connection, which they studiously avoided talking about out loud.  It was easier to run, far from any of the distractions of Beacon Hills.

"Is Derek the right person for Stiles?" Scott asked, as they crossed a rocky plateau.

It wasn't the question Isaac had anticipated, and one he had no clear answer for.

"He chased me off of Stiles, red eyes and all, to save his life.  But you're a better friend to me than Derek ever was."

"Then why did he leave town?"

Isaac had no answers left.

***

Lydia let out a blood-curdling shriek, right there in the car.

Allison's first reflex was to put her hand over Lydia's mouth.  It didn't stop the screams or the far-off look in Lydia's eyes.

"Lydia! Not while I'm driving."

"STILES!" Lydia screamed when Allison took her hand away, just as loud.  "He's dying!"

Allison picked Derek's locks in record time and pulled Lydia inside.  Lydia hadn't made a sound since yelling Stiles' name.   She was frozen to the spot, looking at the floor, when Allison finally shut the door and turned. A sharp smell filled her nose.

"Is that-" Lydia asked.

"Blood. And worse."

Allison took Lydia's hand, leading her forward into the dimly lit loft. Her eyes followed Lydia's terrified gaze to a shape on the floor.

"Stiles wouldn't do magic this evil.  He's-" Allison stopped there, not believing what they saw on the floor in front of them – symbols painted in blood, and Stiles slumped in the center of it all, a dark line across his throat and a pool of blood congealed around his head.

Behind them, the door burst open and Derek howled his pain, eyes blazing red.

***

Derek stood at the center of the spell circle looking down at the human he loved and might be too late to save.  His life was crashing down around him.  He'd kept the illusion alive so long that he had started to believe it was true.  Stiles, safe.  Stiles, alive.  An uncursed existence.  He knelt and touched the dried blood on Stiles neck as Lydia and Allison watched from the corner.

"He's alive, barely," Derek shouted at them, still in wolf form.  "Help me!"

They helped him turn Stiles over, breaking the spell lines.

"Where have you been?" Lydia asked.  "He missed you, you know."

"I needed something to stop-"

A sharp knock came on the now-broken door that hung at a slant and they looked up together to see Peter there.  Lydia was instantly on guard and leaned back against Allison.

"Derek!  When did you get back?" Peter asked.

"What the hell are _you_ doing here?" Derek snarled at him and Peter raised his hands innocently.

"I heard her scream," Peter offered as explanation and pointed at Lydia.

"He was using magic," Derek said, confused and panicking.  "Help me get him to a hospital."

"And tell them what?  That you burst in on a ritual sacrifice?  That your claws cut his throat?"

"I won't let him die," Derek insisted.

"Then save him.  You have it in you."

Derek turned and looked down at Stiles, motionless and near death.  He put his claws on either side of Stiles' head and used the power wolves still had in them to take the pain and harm from Stiles in thick black pulses.  It hurt, but that didn't matter.  It would cost him his alpha power, but there was never a choice.

Lydia watched Peter, who seemed transfixed by Derek's heroics.  But Peter was smiling ever so slightly and it terrified her.

Derek roared out his desperation and pain, as Lydia and Allison took a step back.  Derek's head was thrown back now, the black lines tracing their way up his arms.  His face had lost most of its color, and his red eyes faded with each second, with each dark pulse.  Stiles seemed unchanged.

Barely five minutes later, Derek slumped over Stiles, and Lydia ran to help them.  She saw the same half-smile on Peter's face when he came to assist.  Peter lifted Derek off and tossed him on the bed, unconscious.

"You'd better get Stiles to a hospital," Peter said, pointing at Stiles but not helping. "He's lost a lot of blood, and werewolf healing alone won't save him.  I'll deal with Derek."

Lydia and Allison lifted Stiles by the arms and together supported him to Lydia's car but they never got him to the hospital.

***

"Where's my car?" Allison said, looking up and down the block.

"Put him in my van," said Deaton from perhaps ten feet away in the alley.  "Quickly!"

"What? No!" Lydia said, surprised.

"Lydia, he- he helped Scott.  How did you know this was-?"

"Before anyone sees us?"  Deaton insisted.  "I moved your car; I'll bring you back soon."

"We're coming with him," Lydia insisted.

"You might as well.  You've got his blood on you, so you probably touched the spell circle.  You'll need some help getting the dark magic out."

"What happened back there?" Allison asked.

"Someone called out.  A very powerful, very dark call, and Derek Hale answered."

"It wasn't me," Lydia said quietly.

"No, and it wasn't Stiles either," Deaton said, and they drove off.

Allison and Lydia spent the rest of the ride to Deaton's veterinary office with Stiles propped between them, each holding one of his hands.

***

In the loft, Peter stood looking down at Derek, unconscious on the bed.

"Plan B, nephew.  Plan B, and Plan C, and on and on until I get everything I want.  Maybe you'll join me now, if I ask nicely.  Or I can ask as the Alpha."

He turned away and knelt over the spell circle, altering a few symbols. He checked the book again, and erased the last of the original markings that had summoned Derek home.  When Peter showed Derek the book, it would look like a love spell gone horribly wrong.

***

A week later, Derek sat at the foot of Stiles' bed in the hospital, while Scott and Lydia waited outside to alert him of the sheriff's arrival.  Stiles slept most of the time As Derek talked softly to himself and to Stiles if he could hear, Stiles woke briefly.  As he listened to Derek he grew irritated enough to force out a few words.

"Derek-" Stiles said faintly.

He could feel Derek's bulk near his feet, he could hear the stupid words and the self-hatred in Derek's muttering, all so much clearer in his blood-drained stupor.  He got Derek now.

"I getcha," was what Derek heard.

"Stiles!"

He was at Stiles' side, holding his hand.

"Derek, gotcha," Stiles slurred.

"Stiles," Derek said gently.  "What happened?  What were you trying to do?"

"Derek-" was followed by a soft snoring.

Derek stood there, his hand firmly entwined with Stiles'.

In the hall, Scott checked his phone quickly, then stuck his head in the room.

"Derek – Mom says his dad's coming up.  You need to go," Scott said.

"Watch him."

"I won't leave him," Scott promised.

A minute later, the sheriff rushed into the room, loudly asking everyone how Stiles was, and was promptly shushed by Lydia.

"He's okay," Scott whispered.  "Everyone at school's pulling for him."

"Stiles," said his dad softly and sat on the foot of his bed. "You'll be okay.  Melissa's coming to check on you again tonight.  These blood and plasma bags are nearly empty – does he need more?"  He left to find a nurse.

***

"I found the book you told me about," Peter continued, his voice soothing.  "The one Stiles was using – it was in your loft, right where you found him.  That's a very dangerous book, Derek.  It killed my father."

"We had it hidden-" Derek explained as they stood in front of the ruins of Hale House.

"I'm not blaming you, Derek.  You couldn't have known a curious kid like Stiles would disregard your wishes and get himself into something beyond his depth. Last thing on your mind when you and Cora skipped town, I imagine."

He left his words barbed with ambiguities and watched them dig in.

"He wouldn't have used a spell like that."

"Maybe he just didn't believe you loved him."

Derek was silent, his head bowing a little lower each time his uncle spoke.

"I can't say as I blame him, though.  Probably thinks you're not capable of it.  Or not ready for it."

"He's _good_."

"Kids do foolish things for love.  But no need to worry; I've got the book safely locked away now.  He won't be tricking you any more."

Derek watched the moon rise over the hills.

"There is a lot in that book that could help you, Derek.   So many things you could undo, so many wrongs you could right.  You know its power."

Derek wondered how far Peter's mind had bent under the book's influence.

"How long have you been using it?" he asked.

"I had an insurance policy in case someone killed me," Peter said, omitting most of the truth.  "But then you packed up the library and moved out of our family home, and I haven't had it since."

***

Stiles woke up feeling more like himself on a wet winter Sunday, nearly a week after he'd come home from the hospital.  The house was silent.  His father wasn't there and neither were Scott or Lydia.   He'd been up and down the hall on his own and around the yard a few times, finally convincing his dad that he didn't need 24-hour surveillance.

His father had grilled him – gently - but he knew the reason for the questions and what they meant.    He didn't remember anything of that night.  He didn't remember going to Derek's or being taken to the hospital by Allison and Lydia, and he definitely didn't remember the magic.  He rubbed his throat, feeling the stitches tug unpleasantly.

Then he heard footsteps, faint ones that still made the floorboards creak.  Derek opened the door and looked in cautiously.

"Dad's at work," Stiles said.

Derek wanted to ask his own questions but Stiles refused to be interrogated further, not in his bed in his pajamas.  Derek settled stiffly onto Stiles' computer chair.

"I need to get dressed, to get out and around again," Stiles said as he walked over to the dresser.  "Find out what happened to me."

He pulled a long-sleeve Henley from the drawer, much like the one Derek had on, and some briefs and changed in front of Derek.  Derek kept his eyes down.  In fact, he seemed to shut down entirely.

"Derek, I didn't use magic for whatever that spell was for.  What _was_ it for?"

"We don't know yet," Derek lied.

He expected to feel different, to feel drawn to Stiles any more than he always had been.  But try as he might, he couldn't feel any effects of magic, any love for Stiles that hadn't already been in there, growing stronger year by year.  What he felt was what he always felt around Stiles: disorientation.

"So why'd you leave?  Why'd you come back?" Stiles asked the second question immediately, realizing he didn't want to hear the answer to the first.

"I came back because I heard you calling me.  I can't explain it-"

"Maybe you heard Lydia's banshee scream.  Allison said her ears are still ringing."

"No, it was you I heard.  You were screaming my name."

"Hmm.  Well, thanks for coming.  Dad will still kill you - and me - if he finds you here though."

"He won't.  I won't let anyone kill you," Derek said, and it was a solemn promise.

"I didn't mean… not kill me literally, Derek.  He's my dad."

There was a brief moment of quiet.  Derek could hear Stiles' heart beating, low and regular.

"And you're better now?"

"I'm recovering.  Most of me is recovering," he said, gesturing to his still-thin body, a bit thinner and paler after the time in the hospital.  He didn't know about the side-trip to Deaton's examining room or the counter-spells that had saved him.

Derek was impressed at Stiles' strength, and spell or no spell, he needed to be touched by this kid, the only person besides Cora that he didn't flinch from.  It had been so very long since he'd been able to put his hands on Stiles without fear of hurting him worse.  But Stiles was indeed recovering.

"Is it dangerous for all your blood to go there?" Derek asked, no longer looking at Stiles' face.

Derek was aware of his own interest, but Stiles was eyeing his crotch as if Derek's pants were already off.  In a few seconds, they were.

Given that Stiles was two weeks away from almost having died, Derek let him lead, take things at his own speed.  Stiles kept up remarkably well, and Derek found himself not caring if there was a love spell involved, as long as Stiles kept going, and as long as he kept his hands on Derek.

 


	5. The Only Way Out

 

  
**Part 5. The Only Way Out** (Senior Year, Fall)  
Derek and Stiles decided there was a way to have it all.  Just not the same way.

__

Papa S: You know, I don't need to hear every last detail of your… relationship.

Derek: I agree.

Stiles: You-?  See, Dad, you two agree on something.

Derek: We also agreed you don't ever want to go on "It's a Small World" again.

Papa S: It's just not humanly possible.  It must be even worse with that hearing of yours, Derek.

Derek: You have no idea.

Stiles:  Did you just shudder when you said that?

__

 

 

Derek pushed for more, Stiles held back.

"Not sure about that yet," was his usual defense, but he was running out of ways to make it sound plausible and Derek could smell the need beneath the tension.

Stiles gave in, eventually.

***

When they were spent, Stiles lay back, his arm under his head and Derek wedged up against him.

"I can't believe I just had sex with a werewolf in my bedroom."

"You sound a little too proud," Derek said with disapproval strong enough that Stiles could feel the frown against his chest.

"No, not even.  It's pathetic.  I'm 18 now.  I should be out on my own, having a life.  With an apartment and a big bed."

"And a werewolf roommate."

"Yeah, sure."

Derek tried not to interpret the tone he heard, or listen to Stiles' heart for confirmation of the distant, disinterested way that Stiles spoke about him.  He tried not to interpret anything, hoping indifference would make him feel better.  It didn't.

"So, USC…" he offered when the silence became too awkward.

"Don't jinx my number one."

"That's pretty far away," Derek commented, trying to sound neutral.

"I want to get far away."

Derek closed his eyes and felt Stiles' chest rise and fall steadily under him.  This was real, right here, this contact, the warmth that enveloped them both.  It was real now, even if it couldn't last.  Time for the whole truth, Derek thought.

"That spell-"

"No, Derek, not now, please?"

"It was a love spell."

Stiles laughed, a sudden, wide-mouthed laugh.

"Why would I do a love spell that kills me?  Why would I do a love spell when you're lying here next to me?  Do I need one?"

Derek didn't answer but he knew Stiles was being honest about the magic.  He rolled over onto his back, and Stiles felt the distance between them grow.

"Do I?" Stiles repeated, propping himself up on an elbow and staring Derek down.

"Stiles, you don't. I don’t feel any different now than I did before I left town."

"Which was abruptly," Stiles said, and Derek heard the hurt in his voice before he could cover it.  "You have your own life, Derek.  You need that.  I want you to be happy just being Derek Hale, not tagging along with me to college."

"Yeah, right, you go your way, I go mine," Derek said softly.   He was silent for a long time as the pain churned his guts.

"Tell me what the hell a love spell was doing in a book full of dark magic," Stiles demanded when he couldn't take the silent wolf anymore.  "You use that book a lot?  Peter said it drove your grandfather mad."

"I used it one time: to give you the spell against the alphas.  It wasn't exactly fun to be popped through space-time back to the room I was born in.  I had no idea it would even work."

"That's really where you were born?"

"Cora too."

They lay there without talking for another five minutes, Stiles dozing and Derek's mind racing with possible futures, all of them bleak.  Derek eventually relaxed and laid his head back on Stiles' chest.

"You could use a shower," he said to Stiles.

"You and your damn nose," Stiles groused, swatting him away and dashing for the bathroom down the hall.  He closed the door and turned the water on full blast - as hot as he could stand.

A moment later, Derek knocked, then slipped in quickly.

"If I could just hop in there with you in your luxurious shower?  That you almost never drain of hot water before I can get in."

"God, you're Mr. Suave-Wolf when you want something, did you know that? I have you figured out now, Derek Hale.  Get in here with me."

His laugh was genuine and the arousal just as genuine.

Derek slid the curtain closed behind them and pressed up behind Stiles, his cock rising between Stiles' legs.

"Good.  God."

Derek ran his lips over Stiles' ear and asked for something he'd wanted for a while.

Stiles nodded vigorously, his mouth unable to form syllables.

As Derek continued licking under his left ear, Stiles had an unfortunate flash of Derek and the women he'd done things like this with.

"So…  you like guys _and_ girls?"

"I like sex," Derek said, pushing his cock as far forward as he could.  "And I like people I can trust."

He rubbed his face across Stiles' neck and felt Stiles shiver.

"Do that again," Stiles whispered as the water burned down his chest and stomach.

Derek brushed his stubble across Stiles cheek until Stiles turned his head far enough to bring their mouths together.

"More-" Stiles said, his dick in his hand and Derek's hand around his, pushing it faster.

"You still have that kink!" Derek said softly.  He could feel the effects as he chewed his way gently down the side of Stiles' neck.

"I have a few.  Some of us howl at the moon," said Stiles, close to another orgasm.

The hot water lasted through the new thing Derek insisted on doing, right up until Stiles heard his father's voice down the hall.  Then the water turned cold.

"Did you lock the door?" Stiles whispered.

"Why would I lock the door?" Derek gestured in soapy nudity.  "Not what was on my mind."

"Stiles, you in there?"

"Yeah, Dad, it's me in here, just showering.  My appetite's back – could you make me something to eat?"

"French toast," Derek whispered in his ear.

"Would you-" Stiles flailed his hands at Derek and mouthed "- _shut up?_ "

"I can't hear you, Stiles," his father continued.  "I'm going to come in-"

"French toast!" Stiles aimed at the door, and a whispered "Get behind me" he directed at Derek.

"I _can't_." Derek muttered, indicating with rude gestures that Stiles was just a little too short and thin to hide behind.  "No fit."

Stiles snarled at him.

"I'm still coming in.  I need some aspirin.  Worrying about your kid gives you tension headaches like you have no idea."

"I've got someone in here!" Stiles yelled out in a panic.

"What? Who?" his father yelled back, but the doorknob stopped turning.  "Is it Lydia? Oh, god, I'm sorry, Stiles.  I apologize, Lydia, if that's you.  Or if it's not."

Derek eyed Stiles with an expression that was as close to evil glee as Stiles had ever seen on his face.

"You - _not a word!_ " Stiles said in a violent whisper.  "Kidding, Dad, I'm just uh, you know?" he finally said, letting his father fill in the rest.  Stiles was nearly in tears from the devastating embarrassment and now Derek had begun to play with his ass again, large hands massaging his cheeks.

"Oh," was all that his father said.  "I'll get the aspirin later."

The hallway was silent, the door stayed closed, and a heavy shaking sigh came over him. He rested his head against the tile as Derek chuckled.  When Derek pulled him around into a kiss, there was a heady mix of cold water, sharp teeth and Derek's cock sliding against his in Derek's fist.  Derek held him in the kiss, and they breathed each other in, muffling the noise as they both came.

***

A few minutes later, his towel around his waist and Derek refusing to run naked through the house with him, Stiles slowly opened the bathroom door to an empty hallway.  He dashed to his room and came back with a pair of jeans in each hand as his towel threatened to slip further with each step.  Just then, his father turned the corner.   Stiles grabbed at the towel with both hands.

"Why do you have two pairs of pants?" the sheriff asked.

"Um, not sure which one looks better on me," Stiles said quickly. "High school kids are so cruel."

"Well that pair on the left is probably too big for you," his father said, pointing at Derek's pants.

"I'm a growing boy.  Got a growth spurt.  Getting bigger all the time."  It started to sound dirty to him, so he quit talking.

His father was looking at him with that same look Stiles had seen so often the past three years.

"Do we need to have a talk, Stiles?  About anything?  At all?" his father asked, looking concerned.

"Nope.  Just need to get dressed so I can get that breakfast."

His father practically fled back to the kitchen.  
Stiles offered to clear the table as a way to restore normality to the day, and it seemed to work.  His father retired to the living room to watch TV and Stiles took the leftover French toast up to Derek.

***

"You know, I was still a virgin at 18, but you can't blame me for not telling him I was saving myself for _you_ ," Stiles explained a few weeks after their shower debacle.

"I remember the day," Derek said, keeping his eyes on Stiles' face as he dressed.

"I think I could probably do a lot better now.  I just haven't had time to… let him know things are – whatever they are with us.  What with the college applications and reference letters and HOLY CRAP my applications!"

Stiles raced to the desk and opened the folder on his computer.

"One more month!" he said, panicked.  "Why didn't I ask for an extension?  USC won't just accept a late app and I'm supposed to have the film to them at the same time."

"Stiles, calm down."

"Calm down?  I want to get into college.  At least my second or third choice."

"I'll help you get them done."

"How will you-?" he said turning, and Derek's face contorted into a werewolf snarl.

"No, that won't work.  They'll just want to know how I did the makeup and effects."

Derek's face returned to its original state.

"Maybe a comedy?" he suggested.  "About a guy who forgets to put on pants."

Stiles looked down at his lower half, still just in underwear.

His father knocked on the bedroom door and Stiles lunged out in his underwear, pulling the door shut behind him.

"French toast ready?" he said, overly eager for breakfast.

"Nearly.  Are you…?" his father asked, looking down at his half-dressed state.

"I'll be right down."

"Still talking to yourself?"

"Working on dialogue for my application film," Stiles said quickly, nodding in agreement with himself. "Scott and I are going to shoot it next Saturday."

"As long as it has no werewolves of any kind in it."

"What? Dad, that’s- that's not nice to say about Scott."

"Scott's different. Did you know that other wolf came to see you in the hospital?  Even when I told them not to let him in?"

"You did what?  Derek came?"  Stiles tried to act surprised.

"I didn’t say it was Derek."

Stiles blushed deeply, stammering.

"Should I set three places?"

"What?" His blush grew stronger.

"You asked for French toast again. You've never liked French toast.  Until this past year, anyway.  So I just assumed your friend…"

"No dad.  No.  It's just you and me."

Derek's mood worsened as he listened to the conversation in the hall.  Rather than wait for Stiles to make excuses why he couldn't come down for French toast, that day or any day, he slipped out the window.

***

As the week progressed, Stiles flipped from panic about his father finding out about Derek to panic about his college applications, and Derek had nothing helpful to contribute to either crisis.  College was a world he wouldn't be part of, not if Stiles didn't ask him to be, and he could see little future for them in a long-distance relationship.

Saturday found Derek back in Stiles' room with his arms folded, leaning on the edge of Stiles' dresser watching him type and wondering when his life had become a teen drama.

Stiles focused on the application essay on the screen and texted Scott to remind him he promised to help make a video the next day.  He hoped that would be enough multitasking to block out the sulking wolf behind him.  It didn't work.  He finally texted Scott to come over "right now Derek here OMG".  After a few more minutes, he gave up entirely and closed the essay file before he could write anything worse that what was already there.  He could see Derek dimly in the screen reflection; it reminded Stiles of the man he'd found in his room years before – grim, desperate, and not at all the Derek he'd discovered over the past years.

"You're right," Stiles said.  "We should try to make this work."

"No, I'm not.  I'm not right," Derek answered, not raising his eyes.

"So say what you need.  Do that for me," Stiles asked, turning in his chair to face Derek.

Derek began to pace the room, never a good thing, but a sure sign he was fighting to get something out.

"Okay, if this doesn't so _clearly_ prove I didn't put a love spell on you, no matter what Lydia or Allison or Peter say they saw-" Stiles froze, midsentence.

Derek stopped too and looked at Stiles.

"He wouldn't have-" Derek said.

"Of course he would have.  He wanted to be the alpha; now he is.   Man, your family..."

Derek's jaw tightened and he returned to the dresser, the sulk deepening.

"I'll kill him," he said after a few seconds.

"What?  Another conversation with Derek Hale goes off the rails!  You can't be surprised at how evil Peter is because - let's be fair - _you knew_ , and now you're getting your alpha on?  What is it with you wolves?"

"It's a pack-"

"-a 'pack thing,' I know, Scott says that all the time and I want to punch him."

"I know how Peter did it," Derek said with unnerving calm.

"Well, great.  How does that change anything?" Stiles asked, tired of it all.  His application to USC remained incomplete with just one week left.

"I can get rid of him once and for all," Derek said, as he began pacing again.

"No, no you can't.  Who do you even have left?

"I have you."

"Not if you kill him," Stiles threatened.

They could hear Scott downstairs, talking to the sheriff, then clomping up the stairs.

"I can keep everybody safe from his madness," Derek swore.

"No matter what Peter's done, he's not himself.  You said that, once."

"How can you of all people defend him, after what he did to you?"

Scott walked into the middle of the argument and caught up as quickly as he could.

"Destroy the book then," Stiles insisted.

"I can't destroy it.  It won't burn – I can't tear it, even with my teeth.  But I _can_ take Peter down."

"No!" Scott burst out, clear on that at least.

"He's behind everything bad in my life," Derek argued.

"And he always will be if you play his game," Scott said.

"He's insane, just like my grandfather, because of that book."

"Yes, definitely insane," Stiles agreed.  "But he's a narcissist.  He loves himself more than life or death."

"Then why does he hate me?"

"He doesn't, not really," Stiles tried to explain. "He just loves Peter Hale more.  Enough to bring himself back from the dead, enough to knock you so low you could never stand over him again.  But Derek, you can't kill him."

"I already killed him once," Derek said, his anger growing as his options shrank.

"And how did that work out?" Stiles countered.

"He's a powerful alpha now.  Even I'd have trouble stopping him if he came after you or Stiles," Scott added.

"And he has the book; you don't know what he could do with that," Stiles said, enjoying the tag team he and Scott had going.  Derek was calmer, barely.

"Then I need another plan," Derek said, his jaw clenching.  "I'm open to suggestions."

***

Stiles was back in the library, searching for anything about magic, but the best he found was an old "Magic: The Gathering" strategy guide.   The librarian was already eyeing him, but he kept talking, as quietly as he could, because Lydia was still listening.

"I hope you get into someplace like Cal Poly," Stiles said.

"Not my first choice.  I'm getting into my first choice."

There was nothing not to admire about Lydia's confidence, except that it ate away at his, Stiles thought.

"I haven't heard anything," he confessed, throwing out a plea for sympathy.

"You just sent it in last week."

"Still."

Lydia rolled her eyes.  "You want to go to USC because then you'd have to get an apartment and you could smuggle your werewolf lover in there."

"He's not my-" Stiles protested, and was loudly shushed by the librarian.

"Please.  The way he mopes around you?  He's smitten."

"No one says 'smitten'.  You've been reading too many novels in AP English."

" _Smit-ten_ ," Lydia repeated slowly, turning the page on the novel she was somehow still reading as Stiles vented to her.

"I don’t want him to be.  I want him to get on with his life and not get hurt when I leave."

"What good would that do you?"

"I have my whole life ahead of me.  I want to go to college, I really do.  I want to make films.   I don’t want to be his mate or his emissary or whatever he has in mind.  I can't explain a wolf following me around L.A. and I won't –"

"So much negativity," Lydia commented casually, not looking up.

"Okay, I _want_ a lover, a friend, a hot guy-"

"Check, check and check."

"Without a huge, I don’t know… 'love affair'."

"Maybe that's not what he wants."

"Of course he does.  He's got a life here, family," Stiles explained.

"Please, what does he do for a living?  He could be a frowny wolf anywhere."

"So why doesn't he just tell me he loves me and can't live without me?"

Lydia put her book down at that remark and stared at Stiles.

"That is what you _just_ said you _don't_ want.  Honestly, Stiles, you are the most indecisive person I know," Lydia chided him.  "You still haven't decided if you like boys or girls, or both.  Decide what _you_ want for once, but have the courtesy to ask Derek to his face what _he_ wants."

"Are you saying I'm not courteous?"

"I'm saying I have to read this chapter and four more for a test tomorrow and you've been talking to me for-" she looked at her watch- "nearly half an hour.  In a library."

***

The night was dark, moonless, and cold.  Derek stood outside the ruins of Hale House.  He was looking up at the library window when he heard Peter approaching.

"Derek," Peter said, his voice masking annoyance.

"What are you doing here?"  Derek asked.

"Look, I know you're not stupid.  You haven't talked to me in ages."

"You've been away."

"Working on plans-"

"Did you hurt Stiles just to become the Alpha?"

"You were never a good leader for this family, despite being the favorite son of the favorite son."

Derek ignored the insult and the bitter twist to Peter's words.

"I knew he wouldn't die-" Peter explained.

"I should kill you right here."

"Here, in front of the home you were born in?  Where your little girlfriend betrayed us all and nearly wiped us out?  Are you going to finish the job?  All because of another human? And a puny one at that?"

Derek roared into werewolf form, only to have Peter roar back twice as loud.  He felt Peter's hand slam into his chest and was flying through the air, away from the house. He struck a tree hard, and slumped to his knees.

"I didn't mean to insult your boyfriend," Peter said, calmly human again.

"What did that book do to you?" Derek asked regretfully.

" _To_ me? Nothing.  _For_ me?  Where do I start?  It's kept me alive more times than I can count.  How do you think I survived the fire?  I barely got to the book in time to save myself."

"It was-?"

"It was hidden in the basement already.  I took it from my father because I thought he'd get better with it gone.  Turns out it doesn't work that way.  He had no idea what to do with it – which is the same reason I get to be the Alpha and you don't.  You let me run things.  You work with me.  Or you can go play with your Stiles all you want."

"Stiles begged me not to kill you."

"Well then he's smarter than I gave him credit for.  I'm offering you a future, Derek."

***

The Christmas lights at the tree lot were a mockery of warmth and hope that night.  It happened in the blink of an eye, between a kiss and another kiss, and it hurt.

"I don't know if I can have this life with you," Stiles said, each word a betrayal of what he told himself he'd never do – hurt Derek.  "I just want-"

"Freedom," Derek said, and he was clear what that meant.  And there were tears on his face.

"Fuck my life," Stiles said, covering his head with his arms as his face twisted with a sob he couldn't control.

Derek kissed him one last time, on the cheek.

"Live that life," was all Derek said, and walked off into the woods behind the lot.

Stiles cried in the icy air, not knowing how to let go of the wolf he'd befriended.

When his father found him, he passed it off as a bad cold.

 


	6. Prom Kings

 

  
**Part 6.  Prom Kings** (Senior Year, Spring)  
After everything had changed, one surprise remained.   No one likes surprises.

 

 

 

  
Derek: Does your father need an aspirin?

Stiles: No, he rubs his face like that when things are too much.  Did it all the time when Mom...

Derek: You do it too, you know.

Stiles: Dad, there's more to the story.

Papa S: Of course there is.

Derek: I'll get us something to eat.  You go ahead with the story.

Stiles: Come back, you big coward!  This is the part where you look bad.  This is the part where he looks bad, Dad.

Papa S: Just this part?

 

 

 

 

"Scott, get in here!"

There was an air of desperation and terror in Stiles' voice, and Scott knew what it meant.  He raced down the hall to Stiles' room.

"Sheriff Stilinski, are you free?" Scott asked, with all the conviction of a drama school washout.

"I'm just helping Stiles get his tuxedo on right-"

"Well, it's just that we need you to check out the gym, make sure everything is safe.  Especially with … you know.  The full moon coming and all."

"Oh god, the walk through.  Is that right now?"

"Yeah, … I can help Stiles, don't worry."  That time, it sounded sincere, and Stiles was grateful.  He kept his mouth shut, no small feat, but he didn't dare upset the plan.

When his father had left, Stiles grabbed Scott in a hug.

"You, man! You're amazing!  Help me get this thing off before I break out in spots."

"Your dad loves you, that's all," Scott said, and paused.  "Did you tell-"

"No!  You'll know when I tell him.  You'll hear the cell door slam."  He jerked the coat off and tugged at the bow tie.

"He won't care."

"That I'm bi?  He'll care."

"He didn't care about the werewolf stuff.  Bi-Stiles is … great news compared to that."

"Never call me that again," Stiles threatened.  "How about you tell him Derek and I have called it quits."

"No way, man, you're on your own with that one.  Even I don't get that.  And for that, your dad _will_ lock you up.  In solitary, even if you say it's over."

"There's no solitary at our jail, I checked.  So why are we going to prom again?" Stiles said, changing the subject back to his refrain of the past month.  He had the pants off now, but the bowtie wouldn't budge.

"Because everyone is?  Because it's normal?"

"It's anything but normal.  Have you seen this tux?" he said, pointing at the black heap on his bed.

"You looked good in it," Scott said, only half a lie.

Stiles gave him a deadly stare.  "Derek would look good in it," he said, and suddenly, that was all he could think of.  Derek, in a tux, on the dance floor.  Derek in a tux, at the altar.  Derek, in a tux, taking his hand.

"Holy crap.  Burn that thing, " Stiles said, pointing at it like it had bitten him.  "Let's get out of here, get some air."

***

Derek was doing pushups again.  He'd gone overboard with his exercises, partly as a result of being tossed around in his last fight, mainly as a way to dull his mind and forget what he was facing.  His brave gesture at the Christmas tree lot had ruined the winter holidays for both of them, and he regretted ever being that calm and mature about Stiles.

"One hundred fifty," he said to himself, barely breaking a sweat.  He remembered prom night.  It was the night he and his sister were out of the house.  It was the night Hale House burned.

"Two hundred," he said to the empty room and kept going.  He pushed aside the flames in his mind, focusing on his counting.  The TV in the next room was white noise, but now it spoke up, offering "Hundreds of new styles at Beacon Hill Mall – Styles you can't live without!"  Instead of flames or numbers he now saw Stiles' face, bright eyes and delicate features, an elastic, ever-changing wonder.  And he wouldn’t have to live without it, if he could just say how he felt, and then Stiles would know.  He might leave but he'd know.

"Two fifty," he yelled, hoping it would drive away the image of Stiles, but there he stood, arms folded as he leaned against the doorframe, smirking at Derek.  Stiles showed a lot of emotions, but fear wasn't one of them.  Pain, disappointment, sadness, all the things Derek was familiar with -  he'd brought those to Stiles' face over the past couple of years, and now he was going to fix all of it.

***

Stiles opened the door to the BHHS gymnasium for his dates, plural, and the magic of prom lay before them.  He had three dates, and that was the only way it could be.  Scott held the other door, while Allison offered her arm to Lydia and escorted her through.  Scott and Stiles hurried to catch up and they made an entrance, four across with arms linked.  Stiles would later admit to imagining it all happening in slow motion with an awesome song.

Prom was theirs, easily vanquished.  But at the bar, they admitted to some hesitation.  Their paths were going in very different directions after the year ended, and no one could avoid that.

"I still think you should've gone to CalTech," Stiles chided Lydia, who was shaking her head.

"UCLA has a much better internship program, and I know you won't be far away.  Film school – I'm very impressed.  You have to cast me in your first movie."

On the dance floor, they confessed a few other things.

"You did NOT pick UC Merced just so you could run in the forest!" Danny said, half disbelief, half admiration.

"That was part of it," Scott admitted as Allison rolled her eyes and turned away, dancing with abandon.

"The other half was to be near Allison, of course," he said loudly in her direction.

They were interrupted by Coach Finstock, and tried to ignore his "dancing" as best they could.

"The more important half was to join their lacrosse team, right, McCall?  They scouted you.  They want you."

"Right, Coach," Scott humored him.

"Ms. Martin," he said, twitching his way over to Lydia, "the ticket committee would like to inform you that all but three people on the list have come to this year's prom," he continued.  He handed her an envelope and danced his way back toward the other teachers and parents at the periphery.

"Who wouldn't come to my prom? " Lydia asked, truly puzzled and a bit put out as she read the list.  "Greenberg, Greenberg's plus 1, and…"

Lydia was looking into the envelope with an odd expression on her face.  Stiles noticed it first, and tapped his fingers against Scott to direct his attention.  Allison read over Lydia's shoulder and her eyes widened.

"Um, Stiles, you need to see this," she said, looking up at him.

"Derek didn't come?  Why not?"  Lydia asked, to anyone who could answer.

Stiles swallowed hard and felt the stiff collar of his shirt choking him.

"Derek bought a ticket?!  Why?" Scott asked.

"His family died on prom night – when he was here with Laura.  Why would he even come?" Allison added.

"He did come," Scott said, sensing Derek.  "He's in the hall right now."

Stiles was silent, feeling the room shift around him, a whirl of questions that had no good answers.

***

Stiles slipped out into the hall as discreetly as he could and crashed into Derek, slightly feral despite his suit and tie, who was arguing with the chaperones about his missing ticket, and why a man his age was at a high school prom.  The chaperones seemed intimidated, but were managing to hold their ground.

"D-Man!" Stiles said, in his cheeriest voice.

Derek turned around and grabbed Stiles by the shoulders, relieved.

"Easy, boy," Stiles said softly.  "He's with me.  I think Coach gave Lydia Martin the tickets – could you check?  We'll wait outside," he said.

***

"What the hell, Derek?" Stiles asked as soon as they were out in the night air.  "Who goes to prom twice?  Especially after what happened the last time?  And after telling me you didn't want to come," he added, wishing he hadn't sounded so hurt as he said it.

Derek was pacing the parking lot and it put Stiles on edge.

"Derek, talk."

"I love you," Derek said, clearly, softly, and with his hands firmly behind his back.  He'd stopped pacing to say it with as much composure as he could manage.

Stiles' face collapsed in confusion.

"Okay, you never open up, you spend years being Mister Dark 'n' Broody, and now it all just comes busting out?"

"Not the reaction I hoped for."

The pacing resumed.

"You WHAT me?" Stiles repeated, still not sure he'd heard right.

"I love you.  I know you're going away, but L.A. isn't that far-"

"It's a whole day's drive and you'd _hate_ it," Stiles said slowly and deliberately, "…although I could use a bodyguard- NO, wait, what the HELL, Derek?  Saying that to me now?  We went through all this a month ago, and you couldn't open your mouth then.  You only open it to bite people, don't you?"

Derek's reply evaporated in the face of this anger.  The parking lot was silent around them.

"Sorry to disappoint-"

"Fuck you, Derek Hale. I-"  Stiles lost it, silently.  His hand was up, he was turning away.

The school door swung open, and a very impatient-looking Lydia stared at them.

"Are you coming to my prom, or not, Mr. Werewolf?  You can dance with your boyfriend – we're all _really_ accepting here.  And it's going to rain any minute; you do not want that on your custom leather jacket," she added.

Stiles glared at her.  Derek glared at her.  Lydia remained immune.

"Talk, kiss, make up, whatever - come inside.  I'll leave your ticket on the table," and with that she rolled her eyes and swept back in.

"I think you pissed her off" they said in unison.

A longer silence fell, and the smell of rain came on the wind. Derek was wearing a crisp white shirt and black tie with the Hale crest on it - and he was a foot away at most.  Stiles could smell Derek now, freshly showered, a hint of cologne over Derek's scent, stirring up feelings he wanted to put aside.

Derek could smell something deeply familiar too - the annoying young man who'd tempted him from the women in his life more than once.  A man who smelled like hormones and soap, a rented tux and the inside of a jeep, all at once.

"I told you, Derek. I told you I was going.  I asked you not to do this," Stiles got out before his voice cracked.

Derek was silent again, not looking at Stiles anymore but down at his shiny patent leather shoes.  He could see himself in a distorted form there, a white blotch with black around it.

"You need to hear me, Derek.  And talk back.  How can I win this argument if you won't speak?"

"I love you, Stiles Stilinski."

"No. No, no, no, not like that!  I still don't know what that means.  You're a wolf.  I'm not joining your pack – hell, I'm not even staying in this town, and you're tied to this, … it's your land, I get it.  But Hale House doesn't have room for me, no matter how much you fix it up."

Derek pushed in for a kiss, desperate to have his hand behind Stiles neck, to feel the need he'd felt in Stiles the first time they really kissed.  It made Stiles whimper to be crushed in that kiss, and yet he put his hand on Derek's chest and shoved him back.

"LISTEN TO ME!  I don't fit in your life; all of us, we're gone by Labor Day, and everyone here just goes on.  Scott's mom, my dad, you – you just go on with your lives."

"I'll come to L.A."

"Sure, yes, come visit.  But come as a friend."

He said "friend" with a finality that slashed into Derek.  Stiles hadn't taken his hand off Derek's chest, and he could feel Derek's heartbeat – fast and getting faster.  Derek's eyes glowed.  Thunder rolled far away, or it could just have been from deep inside Derek.

"Derek?!"

A light rain was wetting the pavement around them now, and the tux Stiles had rented, and the white shirt Derek had dug out from a long-ago night.

"I can't get this tux wet.  It'll probably melt and stick to me forever.  Come inside, hang out with us, have a drink, _and if you say-_ " Stiles squeezed in the words preemptively because Derek was turning away, "-if you say, 'No, I'm going to be a Lone Wolf', I will hit you.  With my puny little fist, I will hit you, and probably break my hand on that jaw, but I will do it."

Stiles put his arm around Derek and coaxed him toward the door, towards music and friends and warmth.  Derek allowed it, but he was cold inside already, tight and uncomfortable.  Stiles had a shitty prom night with the sourest of wolves, even though Scott and Allison won Prom King and Queen.

***

It took Derek four months to see his way out.  Stiles left Beacon Hills before that happened though, on a hot and windy July day when the smell of forest fires came from close by, the legacy of a long, dry spring.  The sky was tinged brown with smoke.

"More there for me than here," was what he said to Scott, who hugged him like they weren't ever going to find each other again.

"Did you say goodbye to-?"

"We basically said it all at the prom."  Stiles' mouth twitched and tugged as he weighed his choices.

Derek watched from far down the street, leaning on the car.

"You know he's right over there," Scott asked.

"About 100 yards back?  Yeah, I figured."

"So go see him.  I'll help your Dad load up the rest of your stuff."

"Scott…"

"Go.  You won't get another chance."

Stiles turned around and spotted Derek immediately.

"Not very subtle," he said loudly.

Derek stared back.

"Are you going to make me walk all the way over there?"

***

Stiles walked down the street, his shirt sticking to him more and more.  The dry wind was no longer able to cool him down.

"I thought we did this already," Stiles said when he was close enough not to have to yell.

"I want you safe, and-" Derek replied.

"I know you want all this stuff for me, but Beacon Hills isn't the end of my road.  It's just the start."

Derek was looking away now.   He wanted too much and he knew it, so instead, he wanted something different for this man in front of him.  It didn't make it easier for him, but it seemed to settle Stiles.

***

Stiles walked back into his house one last time, deep in conversation with Scott, who looked over his shoulder at Derek just once.  They left soon after, heading away from Derek.  Derek stared at the car as it vanished in the distance; Stiles' father stared too, then went back inside, his stride a bit wearier than usual.  Derek stared at Stiles' house for a long time, the dry wind and smoke making his eyes burn.

"You don't get to be an alpha by re-enacting every leaving-for-college cliché," said a familiar voice.

Derek turned back to his car to see Peter standing by the passenger side.

"Although you won't be an alpha again, well, _ever_ ," Peter teased.

"You-" Derek snarled.

"Missed me?  I was having plans drawn up for Hale House.  Let's go somewhere with air conditioning and I'll show them to you.  It'll take your mind off your doomed love affair."

 


	7. When the Smoke & Flame Called My Name || Epilogue

 

  
**Part 7. When the Smoke and Flame Called My Name** (University, 1st Semester)  
In which Lydia has plans, Derek has plans of his own, and everyone's homecoming plans go up (or is it down?) in flames.

 

 

 

  
Stiles: Promise you won't arrest anyone for what you hear next.

Papa S: Oh, we're way past arrests.  And you…  with a man four years older than you when you were barely 18. And when you were under 18-

Stiles: Dad!

Derek: Your son is a good person, Sheriff.

Papa S: He's still my son.

Derek: He saved me more times than I can count.

Papa S: Then we have one thing in common.

Stiles: You – you have your hatred of It's a Small World in common too!

 

 

 

"I'll be there, Scott.  Lydia and I are driving up Wednesday.  … No, we're not 'a couple'.  She's got a cute jock boyfriend now, treats her way better than Jackson ever did, and I've got a… a shitload of work. … Dude, making films is not Happy Free Fun Time!  See you Thursday at the barbecue?  Cool- … No, no don't invite him. … What?! … It is not!  It is not a "pack thing" to invite Derek to the lacrosse game at Homecoming.  Oh, you already did, well, thanks for the heads up."

Stiles hung up on Scott, regretted it briefly, and then called Lydia.

***

"Would you slow down?" Lydia complained, her hands tight on the dashboard.  "This jeep wasn't meant to go 85, and it certainly wasn't made to carry _me_."

"What are you talking about? It's... comfortable," Stiles argued, settling on the best word he could honestly use.  He slowed to 75.

"If you don't want to see Derek, then what's your hurry?"

"It was _your_ hurry, I thought.  Something about time to stop by your place and get some outfits to try on?"

"Not to get my old stuff – I need to get something… new, something bright."

"We live in L.A., Lydia!  Better shopping is just one of the advantages."

"Beacon Hills has Boutique Cerise, my favorite.  Besides, what are you going to wear to the homecoming game, college man – that old hoodie?"

"Not wearing a tux again, that's for sure.  Friggin' disaster suits.  Nothing good comes from wearing a tux."

"So you're not going to wear one when you marry Derek?"  Lydia side-eyed him and her mouth turned up at one corner, but Stiles just pushed the jeep back up to 85 and let the suspension do its worst.

"Okay, okay, I overstated your love for him," she conceded.

"Love?  I don't love him – he's four years older, for one thing."

"I thought it was five," she teased.

"Four years and four months, so he ended up a grade ahead but it's not five, not that much."

Lydia watched this oddly calm, matter-of-fact defense with amusement and decided to push another button.

"Allison and I were looking through some of her family's books before she left.  Apparently there used to be... potions and stuff to de-wolf people, make them human again-"

"Lydia, look, if you want to survive the trip, just drop it.  I mean, I wouldn't want to make him not be what he is.  How cruel is that to try to drive away his true nature?  I mean, yeah, he could be a little less claw-y, but the fangs I kinda like-"  He caught himself rubbing a sensitive spot on his neck and shut his mouth, briefly.   "And those potions don't work on purebloods, only on recruits, which you'd know if you had-"

He stopped when he saw her smiling out the window.

"How do you _do_ that?"

"Look, you've been in L.A. for three months, and you aren't getting over him-"

"I am _so_!" Stiles protested heartily.

"-so rather than protest, to me, of all people… I mean, come on, Stiles, I know those looks on your face, all ten of them - they all mean you're in love.  I used be on the other end of them.  Since elementary school."

"He's a _wolf_.  You- wait, you noticed me in elementary school?"

"He's a wolf and you're what? His moon?" she mocked.  "His wolfsbane!  His Omega!  His-"

"I'm just his friend!  I can't love him if doesn't love himself.  Two months won't have changed that...."

Lydia stared at the road ahead, mentally adding another point to her scoreboard.  Stiles dropped to 70 and stayed there.

***

Just as they saw the first Beacon Hills exit, Stiles' phone rang, followed by Lydia's, startling them out of their tense silence.  Stiles took the turnoff to Beacon Hills, pulled off into a gas station and answered.

"Where are you?" Scott yelled out of the phone.

"We're by the minimart by the freeway, why?" Lydia answered Allison's simultaneous question.

"Look east!" Scott said, clearly upset.

Stiles stepped out of the car and immediately saw the smoke billowing up over the trees.

"What is that?" he asked Scott.

"Hale House.  Get over here!"

"What's left to burn?" Lydia asked Allison, who gave what details she could.  She kept back the part about Derek maybe being inside.

***

Stiles had been ready for anything on this visit – angry sex, fighting, wolfed-out Derek or wordless Derek, minutes turning into hours under the dark moon that was Derek's depressing inability to see reason.  Homecoming would be hard enough.  But now _this_.

He pulled the jeep as close as he could with all the fire equipment in the way, and dashed toward Scott.

"Where is he?  Where's Derek?"

"He's not in there….I- I don’t think, anyway, " Scott said as flames ate through the remaining walls and leaped high into the sky, far ahead of the crews battling the blaze.

"WHERE IS DEREK?" Stiles yelled, running toward the fire, but his words were lost in the commotion. the crackling collapse of the roof and the arrival of a third truck.  Stiles moved closer to the house despite the intense heat, but his father intercepted him and dragged him away, furious.  Sheriff Stilinski moved them all back to a safe distance as Stiles struggled against his arm.

"What is wrong with you?" his father asked, but Stiles' eyes were on the fire, then on Scott and Lydia, and then he was staring into the distance.

And then Stiles stopped struggling.  He could just make out the dark figure far off in the trees.  He calmed outwardly, but raged inside.  Derek was there.  He was alive.  And he was just _watching_.

"I'm going to get my phone," Stiles said suddenly, confusing his father.

"What? No, you stay where I can see you."

"Dad, it's just the phone, with the camera in it?  I can use this footage in class."

"Oh.  Well, that's morbid of you."

"Documenting it all on film, dad.  Best Documentary Short Subject award someday," Stiles babbled as he headed off.  He detoured when his father was distracted by another wall collapsing.

***

Derek was nearly 500 feet away but Stiles could see him clearly in the bright glow of the fire.  He was motionless, his eyes fixed on the house.  As Stiles sprinted closer through the trees, leaping over branch and bush, Derek's eyes shifted to him and Stiles stumbled.  He slowed his approach and searched Derek's face for an emotion, a sign, anything.  Derek never took his eyes off Stiles.

"You-" Stiles began, but had no words.

"I have nothing here.  Hale House is from another time and it needs to join the rest of the ghosts," Derek said, his voice strong and clear.

"You started this?"

"I need a new home."

"Most people get a U-Haul and a cheap apartment."

Derek's eyes stayed locked on Stiles'.  Stiles blinked first.

"Were you thinking of crashing in my dorm room?" he asked, wildly upset.

"I was not," Derek replied calmly.

"Then why?  Your family has been here forever.  This was … you were _born_ here!"

"We've been here since 1894," Derek corrected him, looking at the ground now as he spoke.

"Yeah, Derek, I'm 19 - that's a hundred years before I was born.  Kinda like forever."

"We came here because my great-grandfather thought we'd be safe from hunters.  And because he was after a woman who was heading west with her three children.  He killed her husband in the mountains, in self defense, and then guided and protected her when he realized what he'd done."

"Is anything in your life good?" Stiles asked.

"It's getting better."

Derek's eyes shifted back to Stiles, but the flames reflected there showed the fire was as strong as ever.

"Did you think about the fire spreading?  This is California.  The whole area could go up!"    He turned toward Hale House, angry now at Derek's disregard for anyone but himself.  "What the hell is left to burn, anyway?  The place was almost half gone already."

Derek was silent.

"It's not spreading, thank God.  It's not even… " He watched a wall crumble in on itself, but no sparks left the house, no leaves caught fire on the trees above.  "It's-  Is it-?" He wheeled on Derek.  "You did NOT use magic again!"

"Nothing but magic would destroy that book.  It won't burn in normal fires; I tried, Stiles."

"And what is this going to cost us?"

"It's a good deal.  We get our freedom."

"And Peter?"

"Peter was already here, seconds after the place caught fire.  He kept rushing forward, too close to the blaze for me to stop him, until he caught fire. "  Derek told the story without overt emotions.  "When he fell, I put the flames out and called an ambulance." Derek's eyes were back on the last flickers of orange as he told Stiles the story.

When the glow finally faded, they found themselves in the deep dusk of the woods, invisible to the world.  Derek blinked slowly and looked back at Stiles.

"I don’t need you to put me up in your dorm, Stiles." He sounded different than he had six months earlier -  resolute, even patient.

Stiles didn't respond for what seemed like ages.  He didn't have a coherent answer that would make him feel better, or change Derek's past.

"So what happens next?" Stiles asked.

"Whatever happens, it can't be worse than what this life has brought me so far.  Present company excepted."

"You want a human who doesn't heal, who dies old while you still look amazing?"

"I want a man who isn't afraid of me."

"You had that."

"You deserve the same.  Someone no longer bound to fears and rules of the past."

The fire behind them seemed to gasp and died out suddenly.

"Yeah, well… you burned down your house – for what? For me? You didn't even know I'd be here to see it!"

"I did this for _me_ , Stiles.  Don't be so self-centered."  Derek's stern look melted quickly into a grin that confused Stiles even more.

Stiles swallowed hard.

"What does a man need, Stiles?"

Stiles could tell it was a big question, a test.  He thought for a long time.

"A home, that's obvious.  A heart, which you have."

He sought for a third, a nice round three.

Derek took his hand. He was warm as always against Stiles' cool skin.

"A hand," Stiles said, feeling remarkably unworthy.

Stiles let the dark enclose them for a few seconds more, until he heard the yells - everyone was calling his name.

"I'll be at the gas station when you leave.  Just call," Derek said, then turned and vanished into the murky night.

"I have to drive Lydia back," Stiles said as Derek vanished into the dark.  "I can't imagine driving to L.A. with Lydia in front and you somehow squeezed into that tiny back seat," he joked, laughing as the insanity of his life got the better of him.  "She's got luggage!"

Derek could hear the wide smile in Stiles' voice and knew he'd done the right thing.

 

***

The fire burned for over three hours, despite the water they poured on it.  There was not a stick of the original timber of Hale House left, and barely even dust from the stones, so ravenous was the fire's hunger.  The water, too, had disappeared, leaving little more than a hole in the ground.

Examiners wouldn't find an accelerant, but they would find the point of origin, in the basement, a small square where the concrete disintegrated completely and the air was coldest.

Derek Hale wasn't seen in Beacon Hills again, although Peter's medical bills were paid in full, anonymously.

***

"He burned his house down for you?" Scott said at the gas station as they were leaving town.

"Yeah, well… No, not for me – for _him_."

"Still kinda creepy."

"Look, Derek's gonna … disappear for a bit.  Keep it quiet, okay?"

"Yeah.  Take care of yourself, Stiles."

Stiles gave Scott the biggest hug then watched him drive off.  He looked around the gas station.  Lydia was standing by the jeep, refusing to squeeze herself into anything before she absolutely had to.

"You can come out now," Stiles said.

Nothing happened.

"She's coming with us.  She knows all of it, Derek."

Derek appeared from behind the building,

"Come on, get in.  And Lydia already called shotgun.  I wasn't kidding."

Lydia was mildly alarmed at the contortions Derek had to go through to get into the back seat, but she wasn't about to switch places.

"Oh my god, sorry, let me move those," Stiles apologized, reaching around and under Derek to extract the jack and the tire iron.

The ride to LA was quieter than expected.  Lydia found a way to get comfortable, eventually.  Derek passed out, inexplicably, given the alarming angles his legs were at.  Stiles had two of the three people he loved most with him.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

**Epilogue: A Wolf in the Snow**   Stiles kept a lot from his dad to spare him the pain.  But the sheriff had raised Stiles alone for many years, and he'd become smarter than the average parent out of sheer self-preservation.

 

 

"We could go to Disneyland, or go to the beach, or- what do you want to do while you're here, Dad?"

"What do gay people do?"

"Uhhh-" Stiles stammered.

"I mean, is there like a gay park or a gay bookstore or something?" his father asked, genuinely interested.

"Dad, I'm not gay.  I told you, I-"

"Yeah, bi, gay….  I'm okay with it, Stiles.  I've known for a while now."

"Since I told you - last week."

"I had my suspicions before that."

The day was not going to get better, Stiles realized.  But he wasn't about to let the gay thing just slide.

"Dad, like I said, I'm attracted to people I'm attracted to, whatever they are.   At the moment, I have one particular-"

"Who, Lydia Martin?"  It came out a bit strained.

"Incredulous.  Nice.  Thanks, Dad."

"Is it a phase?  Maybe a gay bookstore would have something you could read.  To help you through it, figure out which you like better."

"Maybe they'd have something _you_ could read," Stiles muttered.

"At least down here, you're safe, even in this neighborhood.  Couldn't you find an apartment in a safer area?  Still, none of that crap you kids went through in Beacon Hills.  No kanimas, no druids, no wolves."

" _Werewolves_.  They're human."

"They were monsters, Stiles, and yes, except Scott.  You got away and that's what matters.  Derek Hale's gone for good, even though they never found his bones in that place of his.  He probably torched it and ran."

"Heh-heh, yeah, look, Dad, I um… Disneyland or the beach?"

"With your skin?  We'd better stay inside at Disneyland."

"Disneyland's…out …side," he trailed off as his father headed out the door with the cooler.

"I have a gay son," Papa Stilinski rehearsed as he walked.

"Bi, Dad," Stiles shouted after him.

"Just taking the cooler out, not leaving," his dad said, pausing on the steps, confused.  "Come on, hurry up.  You can tell me all about this guy you're dating – it is a guy, right? - on the way there."

"We're not-"

He gave up, sighing, and managed not to think too much about "the guy he wasn't dating," despite the fact that his jeep smelled a lot like Derek now, and had a few large new scratches from a poorly timed make-out session.

***

**_If only._ **

If only Derek hadn't insisted on shadowing them through the park that day, from Main Street USA all the way to Mr. Toad's Wild Ride.

Stiles was a complete wreck by the end of the Matterhorn Bobsleds ride, praying that his dad hadn't noticed there were _two_ Abominable Snowmen roaring at them from the dark - red eyes, claws and all….

"Was that … Derek Hale on the Matterhorn?" his father asked.

 

 

 

 

 

  
**END**

 


	8. Soundtrack / Fanmix

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Soundtrack is at box.com (link below).

 

[ ](https://app.box.com/s/40qqrbqf0l5ad6q1waze)

[HALE HOUSE IS BURNING: SOUNDTRACK](https://app.box.com/s/40qqrbqf0l5ad6q1waze) (listen/dl here)

 

**1: What You Know (Two Door Cinema Club)**   
**And I can tell just what you want  
You don't want to be alone **

 

**2: Don't Let Him Go (REO Speedwagon)**   
**The wait may be worth it,  
But how can you wait anymore? **

 

 **3: Safe and Sound (Capital Cities)**  
 **You could be my luck  
Even if the sky is falling down  
I know that we'll be safe and sound**  
~  
 **I could lift you up**  
I could show you what you wanna see  
And take you where you wanna be

 

 **4: Bleeding (Prom Kings)**  
Don't you know  
This has me more than bleeding   
Don't you know  
I can not fight this feeling  
Don't you go  
Can you not hear me screaming no, no

 

**5: Signal Fire (Snow Patrol)**   
**No, I don't wanna wait forever**   
**In the confusion and the aftermath**   
**You are my signal fire**   
**The only resolution and the only joy**

 

 **6: The One That Got Away (The Civil Wars)**  
I miss the way you wanted me  
When I was staying just out of your reach  
Begging for the slightest touch  
Ooh, you couldn't get enough, mmm

 

 **7: Burning House of Love (X)**  
 **Cause you're in your bed, I'm in mine**  
On either side of town  
I think I might take a ride  
And burn your love house down

 

  



	9. HALE HOUSE IS BURNING :: ART MASTERPOST

Artwork by [](http://thecheekydragon.livejournal.com/profile)[**thecheekydragon**](http://thecheekydragon.livejournal.com/) for [_Hale House is Burning_](http://write-light.livejournal.com/492922.html) by [](http://write-light.livejournal.com/profile)[**write_light**](http://write-light.livejournal.com/)

Done for [](http://sterek-big-bang.livejournal.com/profile)[**sterek_big_bang**](http://sterek-big-bang.livejournal.com/), 2013.

COVER  


PROLOGUE  


PART 1  


PART 2  


PART 3  


PART 4  


PART 5  


PART 6  


PART 7  


EPILOGUE  


 

DIVIDERS

FANMIX COVER ART & TRACKLIST  



End file.
